The Second Kyuubi Vessel
by Digitaldestiny360
Summary: Many people think that Naruto is the only vessel for the Kyuubi’s power. That isn’t true though. My name is Zeo Takamaru, age 12, the second vessel
1. The Beginning

Heh, I know I need to work on my other stories, but it's been Naruto that's been catching my mind since it came out, until that obsession is over, expect nearly everything I say or do to be about either Naruto or ninjas and samurai.

The introduction will be by Zeo, but I won't write the story in first person.

Also, I won't use the Japanese jutsu names, unless it's something like Bunshins or henges, it takes to much time trying to remember what I did when I try to edit things.

**_The Second Kyuubi Vessel_**

_Many people think that Naruto is the only vessel for the Kyuubi's power. That isn't true though, as great as he is becoming, he was only a child then. And there was no way he could hold all of its power. And that's where I come in, I was chosen to hold the second half of the power, but I'm not mentioned for a few reasons, my name is Zeo Takamaru, age 12, a student in the same academy as Naruto. The difference is, no one knows about my half, and another difference is that I do know something is inside me, I just don't know what. While the conscience, and half of the power of the Kyuubi may lie in Naruto, in me lies the rest of the power. The power to become the strongest ninja, and also, the most uncontrollable. This is my story, the story of Zeo Takamaru, the Second Kyuubi Vessel._

"Gah, I'm late for school!" Zeo said as he packed up his stuff and headed for the academy, his first day to be exact.

Only six years old and he already knew a few jounin jutsus, well only two, Grand Fireball jutsu and Water Dragon jutsu.

He had even created a few of his own, well only one useful one, the rest were more or less just jokes.

He had pitch-black hair that didn't seem to have ever been combed in his life and his eyes were light brown.

He also had his trademark jacket, a black jacket, a bit scratched and torn since he had no money to buy another and finally, a small pair of red pants.

As he headed towards the academy, he had only one thought on his mind.

"I should have eaten breakfast before I left."

It was then that he ran into someone, an Uchiha, the prodigy to be exact.

Uchiha Itachi, already a Jounin at age 11 and Anbu leader by age 12.

Now he was age 13, and though Zeo didn't know it, it wouldn't be long until this would be one of the last Uchiha's left alive.

Itachi had already readied every part of his plan, and it would come to existence in only a few weeks.

Though Zeo didn't know that, he did know one thing, his demonic chakra was flaring up and trying to fight back as if it saw this person as a threat that needed to be eliminated.

And to tell the truth, he felt the same as he looked into the mans eyes.

Something about him was just off, his eyes were threatening and calculating, as if trying to decide if whom he saw was worth being left alive.

"Uh... sorry" Zeo said as he ran off, not seeing Itachi activate his Mangekyou Sharingan and use a weak Genjutsu to turn Zeo to another direction.

"I must test it on one who holds no chance of realizing it" Itachi thought, as if attempting to justify his actions.

He then walked off, headed towards a secret training area of his.

Zeo continued to run, not realizing that he was now nearing the Hyuuga complex and also not realizing that he had been noticed and was now being glared at with killer intent by two main house Hyuuga.

It was at that moment that his demonic chakra flared up at the killer intent, breaking the Genjutsu, causing Zeo to trip and fall to the ground as the area suddenly changed.

"Where am I?" Zeo said in confusion as he looked around.

"You are in the Hyuuga complex you fool, and a failure with no clan like you has no right to be here" the Hyuuga member said with the Byakugan active and a glare on his face, killer intent flaring at an incredibly high rate.

"But I'm just trying to get to the academy" Zeo said as he gulped.

"I care not for the ambition of fools!" the Hyuuga said.

"And don't forget, he came on our lands, we have the right to punish him in any means necessary.

As Zeo heard that, his eyes widened in fear.

"What did I do to deserve this?" he thought as he turned and tried to run.

Before he could take even a few steps, the first Hyuuga he had talked to appeared in front of him and slammed his fists into Zeo's Tenketsu points, knocking him back towards the second Hyuuga, who did the same, knocking him forward to the first attacker, who hit him back again.

At this point, he was beginning to see a pattern.

"I hope this ends soon," he thought as his body stopped any and all functions and he could do nothing but take the hits.

After a few hours, they did an ending strike by slamming their fists into him from the front and the back and letting him drop to the ground.

"That's your punishment for coming here, you clanless child" the Hyuuga's said as they walked off, leaving him there, unable to move.

"From now on... I hate Hyuuga's" Zeo thought as he tried and failed to move his body but found that it was blocked off, as well as his human chakra, but his demon chakra was free from the binding.

"So they can't bind the other chakra," he thought before smirking a small bit as he began to transfer the demon chakra through his body, freeing himself and allowing him to move.

"I better get going, if I was late before, I'm really late now!" Zeo thought as he sprinted off, running at incredible speeds due to the demon energy.

**Meanwhile at the Academy**

" Is there a Zeo Takamaru here?" the Iruka sensei asked asked and when no one raised his hand, he began to mark him absent.

"Hey, wait!" Zeo said as he turned the corner and fell to the ground at the classroom door, his demon chakra no longer active since his body couldn't take it.

"Zeo... is present!" he said with a smirk as he looked up with a grin before falling unconscious.

The rest of the kids in the class could only stare at Zeo with a look of confusion.

It was then that the Iruka noticed the wounds on his body and saw that he seemed to have most of his chakra blocked off.

"He was hit by the Jyuuken!" the Iruka thought with surprise before picking him up and turning to the other students.

"Stay here, I have to take him to the nurse, he seems to be injured" the teacher said as he left the classroom.

Most of the kids remaining began to talk about Zeo's entrance and condition at that point while Naruto just pretty much pouted.

"I shoulda had that entrance, that was cool!" Naruto thought.

"Heh, that was pathetic, big brother would never get in that bad of shape" Sasuke thought, still believing his brother was great.

"Huh, what happened?" Shikamaru asked as he woke up and yawned before looking around.

He listened in on the conversations and knew what had happened in only a few minutes.

"So a kid named Zeo came in injured and fell to the ground there. But there's no blood," Shikamaru thought as he looked at where Zeo had supposedly been.

"So he must have been hit by the Jyuuken" Shikamaru thought before yawning and lying back down.

Akamaru was currently hiding from where he had sensed Zeo's energy, confusing Kiba greatly.

"Akamaru? What's wrong?" Kiba asked as he stared at the cowering Akamaru.

Besides them though, the others were mostly just talking, except for one.

Shino Aburame, his bugs were going insane, flying around through his body at high speeds, causing some damage to him as his body had not adapted to the speed of the bugs.

"He has power, and yet, he seems to be a fool in the same, I must know more" Shino thought as he held himself up from falling to the ground through only his will.

**Meanwhile, at the Nurses Office**

"These injuries seem to be pretty severe, even by the Jyuuken standards, where did you receive these wounds?" the nurse asked Zeo as she saw the bruises and sensed the blocked chakra.

"Well... I guess I must have been at the Hyuuga complex, but I don't know how," Zeo said as a confused look came over his face.

"Don't know how? You mean you don't know how you were attacked?" the nurse asked.

"No, I mean I don't know how I got there, I was in front of the academy getting ready to walk in, then I was being yelled at for entering the Hyuuga compound" Zeo said, causing the teacher to frown.

"He probably didn't teleport, so it must have been a genjutsu, but who would use it on this poor kid, I mean, the Kyuubi sure, but this isn't that blond kid at all" The nurse thought, not noticing as Zeo's demonic chakra suddenly flared up in anger.

"What's going on, why am I getting angry?" Zeo thought before looking at the look on the nurse's face.

"She's probably just angry that I got attacked" Zeo thought. It was then that the nurse turned back to him.

"Did you meet anyone on the way to the academy?" she asked, wondering if he might have a clue who did this to him.

"Um... ya, I ran into Itachi Uchiha" Zeo said, remembering the confrontation and shivering a bit in fear.

The nurse frowned at that, "That rules that out, someone like Itachi would never have done that, I'll just forget he said that no reason to get Itachi mixed into this" the nurse thought before beginning to heal Zeo's body, or at least, she tried to, but blinked when she saw his body was already fully healed, there wasn't a scratch on him.

"Talk about fast healing" she thought as she blinked before her eyes hardened.

"The only person who has that level of healing is that demon kid, this kid's probably a demon as well" the nurse thought before her eyes were covered with a killer intent.

As this happened, Zeo's demonic chakra went off and the nurse sensed it.

"So he is a demon!" the nurse yelled as she grabbed a needle from the rack and used a jutsu to transform the needle into a kunai.

She then proceeded to attack him with the kunai.

'Hey, what are you doing?" Zeo asked as he jumped out of the way of the attack and ducked under a table to dodge the second attack.

"I'm exterminating a demon," she said with a look of pure hatred in her eyes as she attacked.

Zeo could only continue to dodge, stunned by the sudden, and absolute change in the nurses personality.

After the nurse finally managed to cut him and draw blood, he regained focus and... continued to dodge, but now he was making a plan.

"She only seems to swing up and down and side to side, and if she doesn't do that, she stabs." Zeo thought as he hid

"While she's like this, she doesn't notice my chakra," he thought from a hiding spot as the nurse looked around.

"Well... I can stop her, but then what?" he thought before thinking of another plan.

"I just need to warn someone without her noticing," he thought as he jumped away from an attack.

"That one jutsu, bunshin should do the trick" he thought as he jumped away and tried to remember everything he had learned about it.

"It's an academy level move, known by almost every ninja, so it probably won't take too much energy" he thought as he moved to the side again, afraid as he saw the kunai slice directly through the desk with ease.

"She's getting stronger somehow," he thought before hiding again and going through his memories to find out the hand seals.

As he remembered, he saw the nurse suddenly appear in front of him.

"Found you!" she said angrily as she stabbed forward while Zeo was stuck in the cabinet he had hid in.

"I can't dodge" he thought before his body moved on it's own and made a forbidden seal before a dark voice suddenly spoke.

"Noctin Ignis" it said calmly as a pure black flame appeared and shot out, destroying the kunai and burning the nurse a bit.

At that, Zeo regained control and jumped over the nurse, making the hand seal for the bunshin and as the weak bunshin appeared, it ran off to get help, leaving Zeo to wonder how he had created the black flame.

He didn't remember using any hand seals, all he remembered was that he had been trapped and then the flame was in front of him with his body in mid jump.

"Die!" the nurse said as she attacked before a kunai appeared in front of her, held by an assistant teacher.

As soon as the weapon was blocked, he hit the nurse in the stomach, causing her to fall to the ground, unconscious.

"Any idea why she attacked you?" he asked as he turned to Zeo.

"Uh... no, she just suddenly got really angry and turned a needle into a kunai... but that got destroyed, so that must be a new one" Zeo said as he looked at the nurses new kunai.

"Destroyed? How'd that happen?' the assistant teacher, who seemed to be a chunin, asked.

"Well... I don't know, she was getting ready to stab me, then she suddenly caught on fire, but the fire was black, it destroyed the kunai" Zeo said, causing the chunin's eyebrow to raise.

"Black flame? That's new," he thought before a few more people entered and asked Zeo and the chunin what had happened.

After hearing the full story, or at least, what Zeo told them, he avoided the part where she called him a demon, the Anbu were called to take the nurse away.

"Why was there a black flame?" The chunin thought as he looked at Zeo in confusion.

"Who is this kid anyways?" he thought with confusion.

"Hey, Kazu!" one of the chunin's teammates said as he ran up.

"Huh, what is it?" the chunin now identified as Kazu asked as he looked at his team mate, a chunin by the name of Santaro, usually called Taro, or Santa as a joke.

"We have a new mission, B class," Taro said with a grin.

"Alright, let's go" Kazu said with a smirk as he jumped out the window and left after making sure Zeo was being taken care of by the people remaining.

Zeo continued to stand where he was, wondering why everyone was staring at him.

"Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned the black fire" Zeo thought before one of the people in the room called him over and told him that he was to be moved back to his class now that the incident had been resolved.

"I'm Zeo Takamaru" Zeo said nervously.

"We know, it's time to return to class Zeo," one of the Anbu said emotionlessly.

Zeo gulped before remembering he had forgotten where his class was.

"Um... I forgot where it is," he said, causing the Anbu in the room to stare at him strangely, not that Zeo could tell due to the masks they wore.

"There are no genin here" one of the Anbu said, the others didn't do anything, but if you listened very very closely, you could hear a small sigh from the younger members of the Anbu.

"It seems one of us must transport Zeo to the classroom" one Anbu member said.

"But who will be the one to transport Zeo?" another asked.

"We must decide who shall transport Zeo," another said. "Hello! I'm right here!" Zeo exclaimed as he waved his arms around.

The Anbu glanced at him before turning back.

"You can transport Zeo," one of them said as they looked at a silver haired Anbu who was currently looking at a certain book created by Jiraiya.

"Kakashi... pay attention" one of the older Anbu members said with a calm, yet obviously angry tone.

"Fine, I'll take him" Kakashi muttered as he turned to Zeo, "Come on" he said as he began to walk off.

"What... was that about?" he thought as he ran after Kakashi and soon reached the classroom.

"Alright kid... whatever your name is, there's your class" Kakashi said as he disappeared.

"MY NAME'S ZEO" Zeo yelled, causing the teacher to open the door to see what had just disturbed his class.

"Zeo... DON'T YELL" Iruka said as he hit Zeo on the side of the head, sending him flying into the wall.

"Yes mam!" Zeo said dizzily.

"... I'm a... GUY!" Iruka yelled as Zeo jumped up to dodge the punch.

"Sorry sensei" Zeo said quickly

"Also... Don't tell the other students what happened with the nurse," he whispered. "Okay" Zeo said.

"... Alright then, introduce yourself and take a seat," Iruka said as Zeo gulped and entered the class.

"Zeo was late, so he'll introduce himself now" Iruka said.

"Um... what am I supposed to say? Just my name or what?" he asked Iruka sensei.

"Name, likings and hobby" Iruka sensei said.

"Alright... My name is Zeo Takamaru and my hobbies are training... and sleeping... my likings are... well fire jutsus and water jutsus... as well as Ramen," he said with a bit of nervousness in his voice.

"Alright then... take a seat anywhere it's open" Iruka sensei said.

"Okay!" Zeo said as he looked around and saw a seat near Naruto open and sat down there, getting the rest of the class to stare, including Naruto.

"He's probably going to make fun of me" Naruto thought was he looked down, a scowl on his face.

"He's sitting by that kid? Didn't our parents say to avoid him?" a couple of people in the class thought.

"Who are you?" Zeo asked Naruto, who just stared in him with surprise.

"I'm Naruto Uzumaki... and I'm going to become the fifth hokage," Naruto said confidently.

"Your dream, my nightmare" one of the kids groaned, causing the rest of the class to laugh.

"Um... why do they not like you? It's only the first day right? Did you do something wrong?" Zeo asked in confusion as Naruto looked down with a scowl.

"No, the whole village hates me for no reason" he said before remembering what Zeo had said about Ramen.

"You said you like Ramen right?" Naruto asked with a happy look on his face.

"Uh... ya... why?" Zeo asked as Naruto began to grin.

"Have you ever heard of Ichiraku's Ramen shop?" he asked.

"Not really" Zeo said, his face scrunched up in confusion.

"Well than, let's go there for dinner, they make the best ramen ever!" Naruto cheered before he felt a shadow behind him.

"Naruto" Iruka said calmly.

"Ye- yes Iruka sensei?" Naruto asked while a shiver went over his body.

"STOP YELLING!" he yelled.

As Iruka walked off, Zeo looked at Naruto.

"Why does he yell when he tells us to stop yelling?" Zeo asked.

"What? I can't hear you!" Naruto said as he tried to get the ability to hear back.

"... Um, I'll just listen to Iruka sensei for now" Zeo said as he sweat dropped and turned towards Iruka sensei, who was currently telling them what a ninja did before putting on a video of one of the wars that took place, blood and all.

He then turned to the class with a serious look and said.

"If you don't think you can deal with those things, leave now."

As he did that, half the class got up and walked off while another few almost got up, specifically Hinata, Ino and Sakura.

Ino and Sakura quickly sat back down when the eyes turned to them while Hinata remembered how her father would react if she quit and sat down, pretending she hadn't almost left.

Shikamaru probably would have left just so he wouldn't have had to be there... if he had been awake, but he wasn't.

"Alright, the rest of the class will stay, but I leave you the right to leave at any time, but if you do leave, you can't come back unless the Hokage and I both permit it." Iruka sensei said as he began to hand out papers.

"There are ten questions on this test, this is only to find out what you already know, it will not affect your grades at all," Iruka said as if quoting out of a book.

"Good, I'm not doing it, it's too troublesome" Shikamaru said with a yawn as he went back to sleep while Sasuke raised his hand.

"Yes Sasuke?" Iruka asked as he looked at him.

"How many people have passed with 100 percent?" Sasuke asked as Iruka sighed.

"Only one, Itachi Uchiha, your older brother" Iruka said, causing Sasuke to smile.

"I'll get 100 percent too!" he thought as he got the paper and looked at the questions before writing down the obvious answers, such as what were the three most powerful groups in Konoha.

"Uchiha, Hyuuga and Kurama" he thought as he wrote down the answer to the first question while everyone else just stared in confusion, mainly Zeo and Naruto.

"There are clans?" they thought as they stared at the paper and looked over it in confusion.

"Is a clan a family... or maybe it means like the Hyuuga... and maybe the Uchiha's are as well... but what about the third clan... um... how about the Inuzuka?" He thought as he wrote the three down while Naruto made up clans.

"The Inkamo clan... that sounds powerful... kind of. And the Orona clan, ya, they sound strong... How about the Uzumaki clan... it'll be the strongest of all someday," he thought as he wrote them down.

"Question 2" Sasuke thought as he looked at it.

"The most used weapon for a ninja is and how many are you supposed to carry?" Sasuke thought before smirking.

"The weapon is a kunai and you're supposed to carry three!" he thought as he wrote it down.

Zeo was also on question two and stared at it with a look of confusion.

"Kunai and three!" he thought as he wrote that down while Naruto wrote his own answer down.

" A knife and two" he wrote down with a grin, thinking he was right.

Next was question three. "How many Hokage's have there been and who is the current Hokage?" Sasuke thought before sighing.

"Four hokages and the third, Sarutobi, is the current," he wrote while Zeo looked at his own paper in confusion.

"Hokage is the leader of the village so... they always say the third and no one ever says anything about a fourth hokage... but the mountain has four so I guess that means there are... Four hokages and the third is in charge," he wrote down while Naruto looked at the paper with a grin.

"Four hokages, and the third, Sarutobi is in charge" he said, positive of his answer since he had studied up on the hokages.

"Question four... what is a sannin and how many are there..." Sasuke thought for a while on this one before remembering the answer.

" They're three legendary ninja with extraordinary skill... and all three of them were trained by the third Hokage" Sasuke wrote.

Zeo also stared at his paper in confusion.

" Um... there are three of them, but um... sannin means three people right?" Zeo thought as he wrote down three for the number and wrote down that sannin meant three people.

He also wrote that the three legendary sannins were all trained by the same person, who trained them was an answer unkown to him.

Naruto stared at the paper with more confusion than any of the others.

"What's a sannin? He thought before writing down a random answer.

"They're a mushroom" he wrote before writing down 17 for number.

(I wonder how the sannins would react if they ever saw this) "Question five, halfway there" Sasuke thought as he looked at the question.

"What are the Sannin's name's? Um, Jiraiya, Orochimaru and Tsunade" Sasuke thought as he sighed.

"I hope I'm right" he sighed as he wrote the answer down.

Now Zeo got to the question.

"Uh... Jiraiya and Tsunade, the other one is a missing nin... so what's his name?" Zeo thought before remembering. "Orochimaru!" he said as he wrote down the answers.

"Man this is confusing... why do mushrooms even have names?" he thought, forgetting he had written that they were mushrooms.

"Joe Bob and George" he wrote after a few minutes.

"Question 6, what do the sannin do" Sasuke muttered.

"Jiraiya is a pervert book writer, Tsunade is a gambler and Orochimaru... is a missing nin" Sasuke wrote.

"Um... Jiraiya is a hentai book writer and Tsunade is famous for losing at gambling, Orochimaru is a missing ninja" Zeo wrote while Naruto stared at his own paper with wide eyes.

"Mushrooms have jobs too?!" he thought as he made up some jobs.

"Bob is a... a hobo, George is an... evil villain built on world destruction and Joe is a comedian!" Naruto wrote with a grin.

"Question 7, How many main hidden villages are there?" Sasuke thought

" there are five" Sasuke wrote.

" there's um... 5" Zeo wrote while Naruto wrote down 8.

"At least we aren't talking about mushrooms anymore" he thought.

"Question 8, what are the names of the main villages... they are... the Water country's Hidden Mist Village. Then the Wind country's Hidden Sand Village, after that comes the fire country's main village, Konoha, the Hidden Leaf village. After that is... the Lightning country's Hidden Cloud Village, finally, there is the Earth Country's Hidden Rock Village" Sasuke wrote.

Zeo wrote the same while Naruto got villages and country's confused so he wrote the Earth Village, the Fire Village, the Wind Village, the Lightning Village and the Water Village instead of the actual villages.

"Finally, question 9, almost done" Sasuke thought as he read the question.

"What is a Jinchuuriki..." the question read.

"It's a demon vessel" Sasuke wrote as Zeo and Naruto looked at it.

Zeo wrote down the answer while Naruto thought for a minute.

"Those people called me a Jinchuuriki when I pulled that prank... so it must mean prankster!" Naruto wrote.

"Question ten!" Sasuke thought as he looked at it.

"How many great tailed demons are there?" the question read.

"There are ten" Sasuke wrote.

Zeo also wrote down 10 while Naruto wrote down eleven.

After a few more minutes of waiting, Iruka sensei yelled Time and told the students to bring their tests to the front.

"Alright, I'm going to say the results aloud.

( I'll make up a few names so it doesn't seem like only the rookie 9 plus 1 to be are there)

"Shino Aburame...8, Akamichi Chouji...4, Amazaka Ryo...6, Borono Shiro...2,Cantero Inaro...5" Iruka said.

A few minutes later and Haruno Sakura was called.

"...9, Hyuuga Hinata...7, Inuzuka Kiba...1, Leoto Minero...2, Nara Shikamaru...0!" Iruka said angrily as he stared at the blank paper.

"Alright, next is... Takamaru Zeo...9, your only mistake was that you didn't know what the third clan was on the three most powerful clans, not bad" Iruka sensei said.

"Tudaru Kino...7, Uchiha Sasuke... 10!" Iruka announced as everyone looked at him with amazement. Sasuke just smiled.

"Next is Uzumaki Naruto...1... and why would a sannin be a mushroom?" Iruka asked, causing the rest of the class to laugh.

"SHUT UP, someday, I'll be hokage, then you'll respect me, you'll see!" Naruto yelled as he stood up with a glare on his face.

The room went silent for a few seconds, then the person behind him then kicked his back, causing him to fall forward and tumble down the steps.

This brought forth another burst of laughter.

"I will become hokage! You'll see" Naruto said, in tears.

Iruka, not seeing what had happened, yelled at Naruto to get back in his seat.

Naruto just glared for a second before complying and sitting back down, glaring at everyone around him.

"You alright Naruto?" Zeo asked, confused as to why everyone was insulting him.

"I'm fine!" Naruto snapped.

"Hey, don't get angry at me!" Zeo said, annoyed at what had just happened.

"... sorry" he muttered as Iruka said the last grade.

" Yamanaka Ino...5" Iruka said as he looked outside.

"There are ten more minutes left of class" he thought before sighing.

"As I said, this will not affect your grades, tomorrow, we will be outside and being taught what weapons a Ninja is required to have. As for using them, that won't be for another month, maybe longer depending on your current knowledge" Iruka said as the bell rang.

"Alright then, you can leave now" he said with a sigh.

After a few minutes, most of the kids had either been picked up or had left on their own, Naruto and Zeo were the only one's left.

"Well... are you going to leave?" Iruka asked them.

"To where?" Zeo asked as he looked outside.

"I don't remember how to get back to my house from here" Zeo said with a small laugh while Naruto glared at Iruka.

"I don't wanna go back to that stupid apartment!" Naruto muttered angrily.

"Fine then, don't go to the apartment, just... GET OUT" Iruka yelled as he threw them out.

"Uh... so, you said something about Ichikura ramen or something like that right?" Zeo asked Naruto.

"It's Ichiraku ramen... you wanna go get some?" Naruto asked while Zeo grinned a bit.

"Sure, why not?" Zeo said as he stood up and Naruto and him headed for Ichiraku's ramen house.

As they arrived and ordered, Zeo took a bite before his face took on a strange look.

"This ramen... IS DELICIOUS!!!" he yelled as he began to chow down.

* * *

There's chapter one, it probably isn't that good but you don't start at being a great writer, that and I didn't have much free time, my update rates will be pretty slow if I don't get reviews, and even if I do, there will be chances that it will still end up being slow due to school and tests and such.

I hope you enjoyed it at least partially. Seeya... for now, only 14 pages it seems, I hoped it was longer


	2. The Demon Within

Meh, I'm starting chapter two now because I have nothing to do, and I'm supposed to be typing anyways, so here begins chapter two.

If you didn't notice, Zeo was still only six at the end of the last chapter.

He will, possibly, by the end of this chapter, be twelve… I would make a poll to see what team people want him to be on, or if I should just make up a team, but since no one reads this yet, that would be a waste of time. So then, welcome, all you people who probably aren't even reading this, (or hopefully are)… to chapter two of… (Or not, I'm out of time) … now it begins.

_**The Second Kyuubi Vessel**_

It had been about a month since the first day of the academy and a few more students had left, now only around thirty of the original seventy students remained.

Twelve of them well known, someday to be known as the rookie nine, as well as Zeo and his team to be.

The others, barely standing out with low grades and poor ninja skill.

Not as bad as Naruto however, who had already established his name as dead last in the class.

Soon everything would change for Sasuke, however, as the last part of Itachi's plan was in effect.

All that was needed was another month.

"We still have a few students… but we still have a while to go till the final test Iruka sensei thought as he looked at the students and sighed.

By then, he had figured out their personality a bit more.

Aburame Shino was intelligent and focused completely on work, but he only did what was sufficient, not what he could completely do.

"I guess that's in his blood" Iruka sensei thought as he looked at the other students.

"Akamichi Chouji usually just eats. He's just as lazy as Shikamaru," he thought as he looked towards Shikamaru Nara.

"On the other hand, the one time he actually did something, he seemed like he had all of it planned out" Iruka thought as he looked back towards Haruno Sakura.

"She get's good grades and her chakra seems to stay perfectly balanced, I've never sensed it flaring up… but she doesn't believe in herself very much, we'll need to work on that" Iruka sensei thought as he looked at a few more students.

"Hyuuga Hinata, same deal as Haruno Sakura when it comes to confidence, except worse" Iruka thought as he looked at Inuzuka Kiba and frowned.

"His test scores are low, but he seems to excel when it comes to actually fighting... that's obvious from the fights he's been picking" he thought with a frown as he looked through the remaining students.

"Then there are those other two, Kenji Hyuuga and Taichi Inuzuka... they're both geniuses by the way their clan goes, both with top marks, but no one even notices them thanks to Kiba and Hinata..." he thought as he looked at them.

Taichi was currently showing off, grinning the whole time while Kenji was silently practicing chakra control.

"After that, comes Zeo Takamaru. His grades are high, and his ability isn't bad, but no one else seems to notice that since he acts like an idiot and hangs around with Naruto... who needs all the help he can get.

He has zero's in every category." Iruka sensei thought as he stared at Uchiha Sasuke.

"Then there's Sasuke, he's getting the best grades in everything, but he's only doing it to try to catch up to his brother, I can't tell what his usual limits are" Iruka thought as he looked at the last student.

"Yamanaka Ino, she doesn't have Sakura's intelligence, but their strength is the same, mostly weak unless they get angry" he thought as he saw the class still goofing off.

"Class, calm down" he said calmly.

The kids glanced at him and stayed silent for a split second before continuing to talk.

At that, Iruka got annoyed. "Class!" he said with an angrier voice.

"SHUT UP!" he yelled.

Now he had the class's attention, they stared at him in surprise before settling down.

"Alright, the people left are getting good grades to the point where we can skip forward a whole month... we'd skip forward further if Naruto wasn't so far behind, than he'd never catch up" Iruka sensei said with a laugh.

"Heh, we should just kick him out" Kiba said with a laugh.

"May I remind you Kiba, that your test scores are as low as his? The only reason you're passing this class is because you excel at the physical aspects" Iruka sensei said, causing Kiba to shrink back as everyone stared at him.

"Chh, he should still get kicked out, even sis says that" Kiba thought with a glare.

"But he's right, Naruto is pathetic!" one of the students said with a grin as most of the class agreed and Naruto stared at his feet in anger.

"Shut up! What did he ever do to you?" Zeo yelled, seeing that his friend, his only friend at that, was beginning to actually believe them.

As Naruto heard that, he turned to Zeo with a grin.

"Thanks!" he said with a genuine smile instead of his fake one that would one day be his trademark, right next to his orange jacket.

"Heh, there's Zeo for ya, always stickin up for the loser" a ninja said. Iruka stared with a sigh before grinning.

"Due to your complaints, instead of using weapons like we were going to do, you are all going to have a pop quiz" Iruka said as he handed out the paper.

"Wait a sec, this is all stuff we won't learn for another year!' a student said.

"Is it now? Well we all wanted to jump forward right?" Iruka said with a smirk.

"And I added in two extra questions about ramen, meaning Naruto will get a better score than most of them. Time for them to know what it's like to be dead last to the dead last" Iruka thought with a smirk, not noticing Sasuke's sad look as he looked at the paper.

"I've only studied six months ahead so far" he thought as he glanced through the test and saw the questions about ramen and sighed.

"So this is to make Naruto seem smarter" he thought as he answered the one's he knew.

Naruto looked through the test in confusion.

"Um... what is it" he thought, confused at the questions before seeong the last two "... ramen?!" he thought as he answered with a grin.

Zeo also found the ramen questions to be easy.

"Iruka sensei set this up" Zeo thought with a sigh.

"Wonder if Naruto will notice" he thought.

About an hour later and the last test was handed in, with most of the students holding their head from all the thinking they had done in the test.

"What was with the ramen questions? What did that have to do with being a ninja?" a student asked in annoyance.

"It had absolutely nothing to do with ninjas, on the other hand, I said pop quiz, not the subject" Iruka said grinning.

"That's not fair sensei!" one of the girls said, pouting.

"One thing you should know, life is not always fair, especially not the life of a ninja" Iruka sensei said, tensing up at what had been said, remembering his own past and what people had told him.

"Alright then, as I was saying, I never said the subject of this quiz, nor did I say it would be put into your grade. This was a test and you all failed" Iruka sensei said before sighing.

"Actually, by choosing to not take it, Shikamaru passed" Iruka said as he watched Shikamaru, who was currently asleep, oblivious to the classroom filled with glaring students.

"Well anyways, can anyone tell me what the meaning of this test was about.

"A whole bunch of random things" one ninja said in annoyance.

"... wrong test, anyone else?" Iruka asked as Zeo raised his hand.

"It was to see how well we payed attention, if we failed, it meant we were easy to deceive" Zeo said.

"Good job" Iruka sensei said with a grin.

"Now then, back to learning" Iruka said as he turned around, only for the bell to ring a second later.

"Okay, time for recess than" Iruka said as the class ran outside.

"I guess I'll grade these papers than" Iruka muttered as he used a jutsu to speed the process up.

By the time the bell rang to come back in, he was finished and had enough time to set up the next part of the lesson.

"Oh, and even though that quiz wasn't graded, I'll tell you the top three scorers. Naruto got all but one answer, Zeo got all but 1 as well and Chouji missed only three, the one right behind them was Sasuke Uchiha, who missed four. Now than, I'm in a good mood, so we'll still start on weapon training. Our first weapon... is the kunai" Iruka said as he led the kids outside to show them how to use a kunai.

"Yay, we get to play kunai!" one of the young ninjas said, causing Iruka to stop and turn.

"This is not a game, remember that" he said as he walked forward and showed off by throwing a single kunai, chakra enhanced, directly through the training post.

"Wow, I wanna try!" Naruto said with a grin as he watched.

"Alright Naruto, that test will decide the order, so you're first" Iruka said as he handed Naruto a kunai.

As Naruto got ready to throw, Zeo stopped him.

"No, aim up a bit more, if you throw it like that, it'll just hit the ground" Zeo said while Naruto smiled and got ready to throw, as he was beginning to let go of it with his hand, Zeo stopped him again.

"Throw with your wrist, not your arm, and flip your arm upside down so the lighter part is showing" Zeo said, causing Naruto to grin and rub the bottom of his nose.

"I know that, just testing if you people would notice!" Naruto said as he threw, and with the help given, hit the mark perfectly.

"Good job Naruto!" Iruka said as he watched.

"But it would have been completely off if Zeo hadn't helped him" Iruka thought.

"Alright Zeo, you're up" he said as he watched.

"Easy!" Zeo said, showing off a bit.

He threw the kunai at a nearby rock with as much force as he could, including using chakra.

The rock sent the kunai flying up and hitting a tree branch that shot it back down, causing it to bounce off of another rock and go straight through the training post before Zeo caught it again.

"That's like what big brother did!" Sasuke thought with wide eyes.

Iruka also stared in surprise, as did the rest of the class.

"Most chunnins can't throw with that much precision!" Iruka thought as he stuttered in calling the next name.

"Chouji, you're up" he said as he saw Chouji get into a stance.

"Huh, that's not the normal stance" he thought as he watched Chouji throw and saw it head for a rock.

"So he's trying a ricochet also huh, well..." Iruka stopped his thought as he saw the kunai fly past the rock and into the woods.

"WHERE WERE YOU AIMING!?" he yelled at Choiji, who just got back in line and went back to eating.

"Alright, Sasuke Uchiha's turn" Iruka said as Sasuke came up.

"This'll be easy... I just can't do the ricochet yet" Sasuke thought as he grabbed a kunai and threw it while running to the side, hitting the target dead on.

"I can still try and show off a bit" Sasuke thought as he got back in line.

"Kenji Hyuuga, you're up" Iruka said as Kenji walked up with an angry look on his face.

"Byakugan" he said calmly as he threw three kunai straight up and appeared above them.

He used a palm strike on two of them to propel them forward and spun around, grabbing the last one with his foot as he spun before releasing that one a bit to the left.

The two kunai's he first threw hit each other and bounced off.

One hit a rock and shot to the right to hit another rock and hit the back of the target.

From there, the kunai that was randomly moving hit the one thrown by Kenji's foot and ricocheted off to hit the front of the target.

Finally, the final kunai hit a rock and shot straight up.

At that point, Kenji threw a small rock and hit his kunai, causing it to go straight down and hit the top of the target.

"Beat that" Kenji said as he walked off.

"He's so confident, how troublesome" Shikamaru thought with a sigh. "Next up, Haruno Sakura" Iruka said as Sakura walked up, a bit uncomfortable.

"Alright, here I go" she said as she threw the kunai and hit the board, but nowhere near the target.

"Maybe if you would move that big forehead, you'd be able to see!" one of the kids said with a snicker, causing a few of the other kids to laugh.

Sakura ran to the end of the line, crying.

Iruka frowned at that as he called the next name, Aburame Shino.

Shino picked up the kunai and threw it and hit the middle, no special effects at all.

Now was Hinata Hyuuga's turn.

She picked up the kunai with a nervous look on her face as she looked around, blushing a bit and threw, missing completely.

"A disgrace to the Hyuuga clan" Kenji growled with annoyance, causing her to look down at her feet as she walked off.

Iruka then proceeded to call the next name and the next name, and the next.

All of the people failed miserably until they were near the bottom of the list.

"Ino, your turn" Iruka said as Ino walked up and threw the kunai all wrong, using both hands and throwing it over her head, missing completely.

"Taichi Inazuka, you're up" Iruka muttered as Taichi threw perfectly and it went through the board.

" Kiba, your turn" Iruka said as Kiba threw and got the same as Taichi.

"Now then, that leaves one person, Shikamaru," Iruka said as Shikamaru walked up and set up the area.

"That's big brother's training arena thing" Sasuke thought as he watched and Shikamaru pulled off the same combo as Itachi.

"How troublesome" Shikamaru muttered as he walked off.

"He can do it!" Sasuke nearly screamed.

But in the end, he managed to stay silent as the class began to head back inside.

"They did a lot better than I expected" Iruka thought.

"Or at least, some of them did, especially Shikamaru" Iruka thought as he walked in, only for the bell to ring as soon as they entered.

"Every time I try to do something, that bell rings" Iruka thought with a sigh as the kids grabbed their stuff and left.

"Thanks for the help Zeo!" Naruto said as they left, causing a small smile to go on Iruka's face.

"He's lucky he has a friend like Zeo, things would be a lot worse if he didn't" Iruka thought, thinking of the Kyuubi, and wondering how Naruto would have been if he had been alone through the academy.

"Well, I guess I better go get something to eat" Iruka thought as his stomach growled, reminding him that he hadn't eaten all day.

"So Zeo, who taught you how to throw a kunai?" Naruto asked with a grin.

"Uh... I taught myself" Zeo said while rubbing the back of his head.

"Cool!" Naruto said grinning.

"Hey, let's go get some ramen!" Naruto said as he ran off towards the ramen shop.

"Heh, sounds good to me!" Zeo yelled as he ran off too, easily keeping up with Naruto.

"Alright, we flip a coin to see who buys!" Zeo said after they got there, and argued for a few minutes on who was paying.

"Head's you pay, tails I pay" Zeo said as he threw the coin into the air.

"Heads" Zeo said as he caught it.

"Hey! That's not fair, you always win!" Naruto said, pouting before thinking of something.

"Let me see that coin!" Naruto said as he jumped for it.

"No way" Zeo said as he moved out of the way, causing Naruto to fall to the ground.

But that wasn't the end of it, Naruto sent a kick up, hitting Zeo's hand and throwing the coin up.

Naruto then jumped up and caught it.

"... this coin... has heads... on both sides!" Naruto said, sending a glare at Zeo, who just rubbed the back of his head.

"It does? Heh heh" Zeo said, acting like he didn't know.

"That's it, you're paying for the next two months!" Naruto said with a glare.

"What? I only tricked you for a month!" Zeo said.

"Fine, three months" Naruto said.

"But that's even worse!" Zeo yelled back.

"Well, you shouldn't have tricked me!" Naruto said with his arms crossed.

"Chh, two months then" Zeo said with a sigh as he pulled some money out.

"Ramen please, I'll take chicken!" Zeo said while Naruto ordered.

"Heh, this is great" Zeo thought as they got the food.

"IKADAKIMASU!" they yelling in unison as they began to eat.

about a month later

Sasuke couldn't get the words out of his head.

"Foolish brother, if you wish to kill me, hate me, detest me, and survive in an unsightly way.

" Run, run and cling to life."

No matter what he did, it echoed through his head.

"How could you!' he thought with pure hatred etched across his face.

"To test your limits... that's why you did it!" Sasuke thought, ignoring the morons behind him that were talking.

"I'll kill him"Sasuke thought, over and over again.

"Hurry up you stupid teacher, taking roll won't make me stronger" Sasuke thought angrily.

"Damn it!" Sasuke nearly yelled out as the teacher handed out a test.

"I need to get stronger!" he thought, glaring at the teacher in anger.

"I wish he'd calm down" Zeo thought as his chakra tried to flare up due to the killer intent Sasuke was emitting.

"If this keeps up, I'll lose control and probably get thrown out of something" Zeo thought with a sigh.

By the time the test had reached him, Sasuke was already done and glaring angrily at the teacher who wouldn't let him outside to train.

"Sheesh, he's really pissed off. I think he's overdoing it" Zeo thought with a sigh as he finished the test and turned his in, right after Kenji Hyuuga and Haruno Sakura, who were three minutes behind Sasuke, who glared at Zeo as he looked towards him.

"That guy is really annoying" Zeo thought as he waited for everyone to finish.

Ten minutes later and the last test was handed in.

Naruto's test to be exact, was the last in.

"Alright then, since Sasuke wants to go train so bad, we're going to go outside and run 6 miles" Iruka said, getting a groan from most of the students, except for Sasuke, who smirked.

"A real challenge" he thought as they headed outside to run.

"Hey Zeo, what's wrong with Sasuke?" Naruto asked, not having heard what happened.

"Huh, you don't know?" Zeo asked, nearly tripping as he ran.

"Nope" Naruto said, confused.

"His brother went insane and killed every Uchiha but him, then he said some weird line and left.

That's all I know" Zeo said as he ran.

"Oh... that sucks" Naruto said, not sure what to say to something like that.

"Eh, he'll get over it" Zeo said as he ran.

"Heh, I'm outrunnin you losers backwards!" Taichi said with a grin.

"Don't waste your energy you fool" Kenji said as he ran past him.

"Hey, let's go annoy the Hyuuga by outrunning him!" Zeo whispered to Naruto, who grinned and nodded before speeding up, followed closely by Zeo.

"Heh, we can outrun you with ease" Zeo said with a grin as he ran past Kenji, who glared and sped up more, causing Naruto and Zeo to speed up as well.

In turn, Taichi spun around and ran after them while Kenji sped up even more.

They soon caught up to Kiba, who also ran after them.

After a minute or so, they had caught p to Sasuke and passed him, causing him to go faster as well, forcing the teacher to run after them.

"How troublesome" Shikamaru muttered from the back, walking with Chouji, who munched on a chip as an answer.

About thirty minutes later and they had finished the six miles with Naruto, Zeo, Sasuke, Taichi, Kiba and Kenji in the lead, followed by the teacher.

"Told ya we we could outrun you!" Zeo said with a grin as a panting Kenji glared at him.

"They still surpassed me" Sasuke thought angrily as he saw that Naruto and Zeo were barely panting while he could barely breathe.

"Damn them" he thought as the last two members of the class arrived.

"You people are so troublesome" Shikamaru said with a yawn as he sat down and looked at the clouds.

"Alright... now then, has anyone noticed we're six miles away from the school?" Shikamaru asked with a yawn.

"Ya, so?" Naruto asked, confused.

"It means we have to go back too" Shikamaru said with a sigh while most of the class groaned.

"I still have a chance to prove myself!" Sasuke thought as he got up and got ready to run.

"He's right, now then, let's go" Iruka sais as he began to head back.

"I won't let them surpass me" Kenji Hyuuga thought as he saw Zeo and Naruto running again and ran to catch up and pass them.

"Do they not have a limit?" Kenji thought, panting greatly while they continued to run as if nothing was wrong.

"I won't lose to the dead last!" Sasuke thought as he also sped up.

"Heh, I ain't fallin behind these losers!" Taichi said out loud as he sped up.

"Hey, I'm the best, not you!" Kiba said as he also sped up.

"Heh, these kids really don't want to lose" Iruka thought with a smile as he watched. "

They'll likely become powerful shinobi someday" he thought as he watched them push further towards being in the lead.

"But with what happened to Sasuke, will he stay so angry? If he does, he'll lose in the end" Iruka thought as they arrived at the academy and entered, just in time for the bell to ring.

"Class dismissed" Iruka muttered as everyone left.

"Yep, they'll definitely become strong" he thought as he looked at some of the students.

2 years later

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU CAN'T DO A BUNSHIN!" Iruka yelled at the top of his lungs at Naruto, who still couldn't pull the bunshin off.

"Uh... I can't do it, that's what I mean" Naruto said, rubbing the back of his head.

Now eight years old, he had become pretty strong for his age, thanks to Zeo's help, that is.

But he still couldn't do the simple techniques like Bunshin and Henge, which was what Zeo had been trying to teach him.

But there hadn't been enough time as the test came and Naruto still couldn't do anything more than make the most pathetic looking clones.

"In that case... YOU FAIL!" Iruka yelled at the top of his lungs.

"Alright" Naruto said with a sigh as he walked out of the room.

"So you still couldn't do it Naruto?" Zeo thought with a sigh as he was called in.

"Alright, all you have to do is do these simple jutsus and you pass" Iruka said.

"No thanks, I'm not going to take this test" Zeo said, causing Iruka to blink.

"Why not?" he asked with confusion.

"If I pass, than that leaves Naruto here alone until he does. And besides, if I don't pass the same year as him, there's no chance we'll end up on the same team" Zeo said, rubbing the back of his head with a grin.

Iruka sighed before looking at Zeo.

"Alright, tell Uchiha Sasuke that it's his turn" Iruka said as Zeo walked back out, acting like he had failed.

"The moron failed" Sasuke thought with a smirk.

He now wore his trademark, blue jacket instead of the black.

His anger had also lessened, though he would never admit it, so he was now the calm and collected (bastard of a) ninja we all now.

"This will be easy" he thought as he entered, only to fail in the end anyways.

Next came Kiba, who also failed.

After that was Hinata, who was too nervous to do the moves correctly.

After that was Shino, who, even with all his knowledge, did not know enough to pass.

Chouji and Shikamaru were too lazy while Ino and Sakura were too weak.

Finally, after going through most of the class, it was Kenji Hyuuga's turn.

But even he failed in the end as he could not answer a difficult question involving clans and their abilities.

Even though he was a Hyuuga, that also meant he didn't pay attention to the weaker clans and did not know enough, so he also failed.

Next was Taichi Inuzuka.

He easily passed the physical part of the exam but failed when it came to the easiest of the test questions.

Out of the whole class, or at least, what remained of it, not a single person passed.

But that was no surprise, most people didn't pass until age twelve as it was.

So it really was no surprise that the eight year olds could not pass.

"That's all for today" Iruka sensei said with a sigh as the entire class left, some of the students never to return, as it always was after a test like that.

"Maybe I should make the test a bit easier" Iruka thought before shaking his head.

"No, that would only completely humiliate them when they got tested later by their new sensei" Iruka thought with a sigh as he looked outside.

"I wonder what tomorrow will be like" he thought before shaking his head.

"Right, back to grading papers" he said with a moan.

four years later

"Alright, Sakura here, let's do it, transform" Sakura said as she transformed into a replica of Iruka sensei.

"Transformed into me. Good" Iruka said.

"Yeah, I did it!" Sakura said as she cheered.

Inside, Inner Sakura cheered even more.

"I kick butt!" "Sasuke, did you see that?" Sakura asked as Iruka called next and Sasuke walked up, doing the same transformation as Sakura.

"Next, Naruto Uzumaki" Iruka said.

"This is a total waste of time Naruto" Shikamaru said.

"We always pay for your screw ups" Ino said.

"Like I care" Naruto said as he walked up with a smirk.

"Transform!" Naruto said as energy completely surrounded him and smoke suddenly appeared.

As the smoke began to clear, Naruto's sexy no jutsu was revealed.

At that, Iruka sensei got a hilarious look on his face before falling backwards.

At that point, Naruto began to laugh.

"Gotcha, that's my sexy jutsu" Naruto said while pointing.

"CUT THE STUPID TRICKS, THIS IS YOUR LAST WARNING!" Iruka yelled at the top of his lungs as the rest of the class stared.

"Sheesh, why'd he have to make that move?" Zeo thought as he put his hand to his forehead.

A few minutes later and the class was over.

"Naruto, the exam is almost here again... we need to work on your bunshin's" Zeo said seriously as Naruto nodded and gulped.

He had gotten better, or at least, it seemed like he did.

He could do it perfectly if he was nearly out of energy.

But when he was in good energy, it always failed.

Zeo and him couldn't really understand it, so they just kept on training.

At that point in time, Zeo had the highest grades in the class, even higher than Sasuke's, but his test scores were a bit lower, not by much however.

In fact, there was barely a point of difference when it came to their grade.

After a few hours of training, and stopping to eat ramen, they had to give up since it was so dark out.

"That didn't work at all!" Naruto said, pouting as he looked towards the ground.

"I know, and tomorrow's the test" Zeo said with a sigh.

"Damn it" Naruto muttered, sulking as he headed home after eating some ramen.

"Well, if you pass, I'm on your team!" Zeo said with a laugh.

The next day, the grades were posted on the wall, and Sasuke was ahead by .1 percent.

"Damn it" Zeo muttered as the test began.

"Uzumaki Naruto" Iruka called as Naruto headed into the testing room.

"Alright, let's see a bunshin" Iruka said as Naruto gulped and got ready.

"Bunshin!" he yelled as one clone appeared.

A pretty pathetic one at that.

But it was at least standing, and did have color.

It just could barely stand and was pretty pale.

"Naruto... YOU FAIL!" Iruka yelled as Naruto looked down at the ground.

"Iruka sensei, he's bad and his moves were off, but he did hang in there and replicate. This is his third try, so you know he really wants to become a ninja, we could cut him a break and... pass him" Mizuki said, causing Naruto to look up with a happy grin on his face.

"Mizuki sensei, the other students created at least three effective replications. But Naruto could only create one, and look at it, it's pitiful. I can't pass him" Iruka said as Naruto gritted his teeth and glared.

A few hours later and Naruto was sitting on the swing, watching the others, Zeo right next to him.

Zeo had passed with ease and couldn't help but frown over the fact that his best friend had failed.

"I passed with ease" one of the kids in the group bragged as Naruto frowned and listened to them talk.

"You'll pass next year" Zeo said with a sigh, trying to cheer Naruto up, which was difficult as he himself wasn't cheerful right then.

"Whatever" Naruto muttered as he looked down at the ground before standing up.

"I'm gonna go for a walk, I wanna be alone" He said as he walked off.

Zeo watched as he left and couldn't help but feel like it was his fault.

A few minutes later and he was sitting on a balcony with Mizuki sensei.

"But, I really wanted to graduate this time" Naruto said, looking down.

"Then... I guess I have to tell you" Mizuki said, causing Naruto to spin around.

"It's a secret, but I'm gonna let you in on it." Mizuki said

"A secret" Naruto thought as he looked at Mizuki sensei with wide eyes.

A few hours later and Naruto found himself in the forest, training with the secret scroll of the Hidden Leaf Village.

He had mastered one technique, Kage Bunshin, and had already begun the next.

A technique infinitely harder than the Kage bunshin.

"I need to take a break" Naruto thought as he sat down, leaning against the wall.

At that point, Iruka sensei walked up, and the rest of the story is well known.

two day's later

"What are you doing here Naruto? This isn't for drop out's you can't be here unless you graduate" Shikamaru said as he stopped and saw Naruto.

"Oh yeah, do you see this? Do you see this? Open your eye's Shikamaru, it's a regulation headband. We're gonna be training together, how da ya like that?" Naruto asked with a grin as Shikamaru sighed and walked off, ignoring what Naruto said next.

A few minutes later and Sakura walked in.

"Hey Sakura!" Naruto said, waving as Sakura ran at him.

A few minutes later and they were at the part where Naruto was pushed forward, directly into Sasuke, ending up in a kiss.

It was at that exact moment that Zeo entered and saw what happened, "What the hell did I miss?" he asked with wide eyes as he jumped in and stopped the girls from beating Naruto to a pulp.

"Alright class, settle down" Iruka muttered as he walked in.

"Alright, time to announce the teams" he said as he began to announce the teams.

"Team one, Zeo Takamaru, Kenji Hyuuga and Taichi Inuzuka" Iruka said.

"Damn it, so I'm not with Naruto after all!" Zeo thought with a sigh as him and Naruto looked to each other.

Iruka then continued "Squad 7, Naruto Uzumaki, Sakura Haruno" Iruka said as Naruto cheered while Sakura looked at the ground.

"And Sasuke Uchiha" he said as Naruto and Sakura switched places.

"Next, squad 8, Hinata Hyuuga, Kiba Inuzuka and Aburame Shino.

After a few minutes of talking, squad 10 was announced.

"Ino Yamanaka, Shikamaru Nara and Chouji Akimichi" Iruka said as Ino glared at Shikamaru.

"Those are all the squads" Iruka said as Naruto jumped up and made a fool of himself.

"After lunch, you'll meet your new jounin teachers" Iruka sensei said, until then, class dismissed" Iruka said as the class left for lunch.

An amount of time passed as the day went on and soon, they were waiting for their sensei.

"He's taking forever!" Naruto exclaimed, annoyed that it was taking so long.

"Naruto, just sit down!" Sakura yelled.

" I don't want to, how come our teachers the only one that's late, I'll show him!" Naruto said as he set up a prank.

"Naruto, what are you doing?" Sakura asked.

"Heh heh, that's what he get's for coming late, surprise!" Naruto said with a grin.

At that point, Kakashi sensei walked in and had an eraser hit his head.

"Hm, how should I put this. My first impression of this group... you're a bunch of idiots" Kakashi muttered.

meanwhile, with Zeo's group

"Don't I know you?" Zeo asked, confused as he looked at his sensei.

"Eh... ya, the nurse thing on your first day." the sensei said.

"Oh, your Kamaka sensei... or something like that" Zeo said, causing the teacher's eye to twitch.

"My name is Kazu sensei" he said, annoyed.

"Any questions?" He asked as he looked at them.

"Is this an assassination group?" Kenji Hyuuga, another member of the team, asked.

"For most part, yes. Taichi Inuzuka. Enhanced sense of smell and pure power. Kenji Hyuuga, Byakugan, the all seeing eye, and one hit victory and Zeo Takamaru. An unexplained, and unexpected defense" Kazu sensei said, talking about the strange chakra that came up whenever he was attacked. "As well as a few of his own jutsus and an amazing chakra capacity, as well as accuracy and enhanced senses for unknown reasons. Due to this teams abilities. We have speed from Kenji, power from Taichi and defense from Zeo. And every single one of you has something that will make you nearly impossible to be snuck up on or trapped." Kazu sensei said as he looked at all of them.

"But also, due to the powers of this team, having you as a 24/7 assassin team is pointless. So we will be assigned whatever mission we are assigned. Assassination, transportation, doesn't matter to me" Kazu sensei said.

"You just wasted three minutes on a yes or no question" Kenji Hyuuga said calmly.

"Alriht then. Let's start with the basics. Your goals, your fears, and what you like" Kazu sensei said.

"Who wants to go first?" Kazu sensei asked as he looked at them.

"Heh, I will!" Taichi said with a grin.

"My goals ta become the best. I'm not afraid of anything and I like ramen and training!" Taichi exclaimed as Kenji rolled his eyes and Zeo just sighed.

"Naruto would probably say the same thing" he thought with a sigh before blinking.

"Wait a second, Naruto had a headband today!" "He passed" Zeo suddenly cheered, causing everyone to look at him.

"Uh... sorry" he said with a grin.

"Pathetic, I'll go next" Kenji said.

"My goal is the same as the genius known as Neji Hyuuga. To become the best of the Hyuuga, specifically the main house. On top of that, I also wish to avenge my father, just as he does" Kenji said calmly, but with obvious anger hidden in his voice.

"I have no fears and I like power" he said calmly.

"Zeo, your turn" Kazu sensei said.

"Alright, my goal is... to help Naruto achieve his dream of becoming Hokage. After I do that, I'll make my own. My fears are... the Hyuuga main branch and Itachi Uchiha" Zeo said as he shivered a bit, remembering that day.

The look in Itachi's eye's, the cruel actions of the Hyuuga's, even the black flame that he had shot out.

"And my likings are the same as Taichi's, ramen and training" Zeo said with a smirk as Kazu sensei nodded.

"It looks like only Zeo passed this part. The others were too hot headed to admit their fears." he thought.

"Alright, tomorrow, we will have our first test, there will be a total of three test, taking up three days. If any of you fail on even one, you will all be sent back to the Academy" Kazu sensei said.

"Come to training ground 1 early tomorrow morning... and don't eat breakfast, you'd only barf it back up" he said with a sigh as he walked off.

"Interesting" Kenji muttered as he left, soon, the rest of the team had also left.

later that day

After the day was nearing it's end, Naruto and Zeo got their first chance to talk to each other.

"How'd you manage to make the team after failing the test anyways Naruto?" Zeo said with a laugh as he ate some ramen.

"I'll show you as soon as we're done. It's really cool!" Naruto said as he ate, glad Zeo was paying as the Hokage had taken his money for one month as punishment for stealing the scroll.

"Heh, alright!" Zeo said as he ate.

Even though Ichiraku had no idea what was going on, he was smiling.

Both of his best customers were happy.

And that meant he got extra money, meaning less work.

"Seriously, I'd have gone out of business years ago if it weren't for these two" he thought, chuckling a bit as Naruto waved his bowl around, asking for more.

"Alright, alright" Ichiraku said a she made a couple of bowls of ramen and served them.

An hour or so later and the two were gone, leaving a substantial amount of money, as well as one of the fattest tips ever seen in a restaurant.

"If they do this every day, I'll be able to retire in the next five years" Ichiraku thought with a grin.

"So what got them to change their mind?" Zeo asked with a grin as a sad look came over Naruto's face, seeming completely out of place when compared to the expression a mere second before.

"Uh... what's wrong?" Zeo asked, wondering if he had said something to insult his friend.

"Nothing" Naruto said, shaking his head and sighing before telling Zeo the story... the whole story, including the part about the Kyuubi.

He also showed off at the end by using his Kage Bunshin No Jutsu at full power and creating about fifty clones as he wasn't working off emotion at the time.

"... COOL!" Zeo said with a grin at the technique before Naruto got rid of the clones and continued the story.

"Well, one things for sure, heh heh. At least we finally know why everyone seems to hate you so much. Oh well, their loss" he said with a grin as Naruto nodded.

"Well anyways, my new sensei has a final test for tomorrow. I need to get home alright?" Zeo said with a yawn as the last of the sun's ray faded away behind the mountain.

"Alright, same for me, seeya" Naruto said with a grin before smirking.

"Race ya!" he said as him and Zeo got in place.

"On your mark" Zeo said "Get set" Naruto continued, "GO!" they said in unison as they launched themselves off towards the ramen shop, which was where they turned to get to their own homes, if they could call abandoned apartments home.

As they arrived at their homes and walked in, they did everything they could to be silent.

If anyone heard Naruto outside, they would do everything they could to get him in trouble.

And ever since Zeo had become friends with Naruto, the same was true for him.

"Either way" they thought.

"THIS DAY RULES!" they exclaimed as they got into their rooms, ignoring the yells from all around to "shut the hell up" as their neighbors put it.

A few minutes later and they were sound asleep, ending one day, and one life, and, in the same way, starting a new one.

One where they would be separated.

And also, one where they would finally find people that accepted them besides each other.

But one thing was for sure.

The fates had dealt them a strange card.

And even if they someday became the worst of enemies, their paths would always intertwine.

That, it seemed, was the destiny of the two 'vessels' as they would both someday be called.

* * *

Well, I've been at the end for over a month.

But I couldn't get the will to actually write anymore, luckily, I actually got a review and that got me to finish the last 500 words or so.

Thank you very much NightAssassin for getting my determination back.

I wasn't planning on it being a comedy story.

But most of my stories end up that way anyways heh heh. As for what the hyuuga's did.

The Hyuuga's believe themselves superior to all others.

Especially the main house.

And the sad part is, things like that really do happen in this world.

Anyways, I was 100 words away from getting 7000. And that, altogether, is a full 46 pages, a record by far


	3. Teamwork? You're kidding right?

Heh, by the time this get's out, it'll be really late, but oh well.

I'll just say sorry now.

The holidays were busy, I had the flu and I had an actual life to live(for the first time in years).

That and I didn't have access to my files.

Add on the fact that I got writers block on page three (then a second on page six) and you get a really long wait.

Alright, welcome to chapter three of...

_The Second Kyuubi Vessel_

Zeo woke up with a yawn as his alarm went off.

"Shut up and go..." he said as he went back to sleep, a mistake he would regret as he ended up sleeping in.

After another thirty minutes, he finally got up and looked out the window with a blank stare for a few seconds before his eye's widened.

"The test!" he exclaimed as he jumped up and, on instinct, made some ramen and ate it before remembering what his sensei had said.

"Uh oh" he muttered with a chuckle.

"Oh well, I just have to get going" he muttered as he put his clothes on and put on his headband.

"Alright, I better get going!" he exclaimed as he jumped out the window and sprinted off.

**Meanwhile with Naruto**

Meanwhile, similar events were taking place with Naruto.

"Gah, I didn't do it!" he yelled as he jumped up when his alarm went off.

"Oh, right, I have an alarm now" he muttered as he almost grabbed some ramen before remembering what his sensei said.

"Damn it, I'm hungry" he muttered, holding his stomach as it growled.

"Oh well, Kakashi sensei knows best" he muttered as he ran off, dodging a few rocks that got thrown at his head on the way there.

**Meanwhile, with Zeo**

"Alright, now that everyone's here" Kazu sensei said with a glare as he looked at Zeo, who was fifteen minutes late.

"Uh... sorry, I slept in? Heh heh" Zeo said.

"Just be glad this isn't a battle field. You'd be dead if you did that anywhere else" Kazu sensei muttered.

"Now then, let me explain why you shouldn't have eaten anything" he said with a smirk as he told them the deal.

"What do you mean we don't get to eat if we don't get a bell!" Taichi yelled angrily.

"I mean if you fail, you don't get to eat, and you also get sent back to the academy" Kazu sensei said with a yawn.

"Wait, but there are only two bells!" Zeo pointed out.

"Your point?" Kazu sensei asked.

"If that's true, one of us fails no matter what" Kenji muttered, eyes closed and leaning against a tree.

"But that ain't fair!" Taichi exclaimed, knowing that, as powerful as he was, he was the weaker of his two team mates.

"Too bad" Kazu sensei said with a smirk.

Now then, let's begin" he said.

"Three... two... one... go" he said as the others jumped off and hid.

"He's a jounin though, we don't stand a chance, I mean... me and Naruto... didn't before" he muttered, remembering the assassin that had attacked them a few weeks ago.

Taichi was having similar thoughts.

"There's no way we can beat him. I mean, he's a jounin, we'd never be able to fight him in one on one. Anyone should be able to figure that out" Taichi thought.

"Wait, that's it! We won't be able to get any bells alone, but if we work together, despite the fact one of us has to fail, we'll be able to get both!" he thought, too bad Kenji had different plans.

"The others should do fine for weakening him. I'll just take the bells once those losers are done" he thought.

At that time, Zeo had decided to attack.

"Even if I can't beat him, I don't need to, I just need those bells" he thought as he attacked.

"Water blade jutsu!" he said as a sword made out of hardened water appeared in his hands as he attacked.

"A water jutsu?' Kazu sensei thought as he blocked the attacks with ease before Zeo suddenly made a fake attack and swung lower than expected.

Kazu sensei jumped back, not noticing what was going on behind him until it was nearly too late.

You see, while attacking with the sword, Zeo had done a one handed jutsu, Kage Bunshin no jutsu to be exact, and it was thanks to Naruto that he knew it.

When Kazu sensei jumped back, from the sword, he ran into the clone, who had used a henge on a pebble to disguise it as a bell.

As Kazu sensei went past, the items were switched with the left hand while the Zeo clone reached in with a fake grab for the bell using his left hand.

Kazu sensei saw that and quickly destroyed the clone.

However, he didn't notice the switch that took place or the 'pebble' that fell to the ground after.

Zeo quickly made a few regular bunshins as a distraction as they all attacked slid in to attack.

The real Zeo quickly grabbed the 'pebble' that had been dropped and watched as his clones were knocked away.

Taichi, having watched from a distance, and having used a pair of binoculars, knew what had happened and smirked as he watched Zeo go in for another bell, only to be knocked away and forced back.

" I have to back up" he muttered, aloud, on purpose as he jumped back, just in time for Taichi to attack with Kazamaru working as the shaodw clone as he used his claws in place of a sword.

"Gatsuuga!" he yelled, causing a distraction for Kazamaru who attacked from behind and switched the only remaining real bell with yet another pebble before pretending to try and take a bell, only to get knocked away.

"Kazamaru!" Taichi yelled as Kazamaru was knocked to the ground and detransformed.

"Damn it" he muttered angrily as he went on a pure offensive.

Zeo sighed as he saw that. "I better pretend I still need a bell" he thought as he went in to attack as well.

After about ten minutes, both genin had to back off, leaving Kazu sensei a bit out of energy.

"They're stronger than expected" he thought as he began to check the bells when Kenji Hyuuga attacked full force, using chakra to cut the rope of the 'bells' and grabbing them before continuing to attack.

"You have the bells, why are you still attacking?" Kazu sensei asked as he dodged.

"I won't just get the bells, I'll defeat you" Kenji said coldly as he continued to attack.

"If that's how it is" Kazu sensei said as he knocked him away, causing the bells to shake.

When they didn't ring, Kazu sensei noticed something was off and pushed Kenji further back as the bells came into his sight, he took a close look and immediately knew they were fake.

"But when?" he thought as he tried to think when the alarm, ending the test, rang.

"Alright, everyone out" Kazu sensei said, seeing the smug look on Kenji's face.

"Looks like you two are headed back to the academy" Kenji said with a smirk as he showed off the bells before Taichi and Zeo pulled out the real bells and grinned.

Kenji's eye's widened as he activated his Byakugan and saw that both of his bells were fake.

"Damn it!" he growled.

"Who's goin back now huh?" Taichi grinned as Kazu sensei looked in confusion before shaking his head and getting rid of the illusion on the bells.

"Pebbles?" He thought, even more confused.

"Alright then you two, mind telling me how you got the bells?" Kazu sensei asked as he looked at Zeo and Taichi.

"Eh, alright" Zeo muttered as he told his story.

After that was done, Kazu turned to Taichi.

"Heh, I just followed 'im" Taichi said with a grin.

"Damn it" Kenji repeated as the scene took place with Kenji Hyuuga tied to the pole while Zeo and Taichi sat there.

"You two pass both parts of the test" Kazu sensei said to Taichi and Zeo.

"You however, pass neither" Kazu sensei said to a tied up Kenji.

"You used your team as bait." he said to Kenji.

"But you, Taichi, have very low test scores so I can't pass you just yet. Here's the deal, I'll pass you, and the only deal is that you two, Zeo and Taichi, cannot give any of your food to Kenji" Kazu sensei said as he left.

After Kazu sensei left, Zeo sighed, looking at Kenji pretending that he wasn't hungry. That was something he wasn't very good at however.

Especially since he had gotten in trouble at the Hyuuga manor the day before and hadn't even been given dinner, meaning it had been about a day since he had last ate, as the branch Hyuuga were no longer allowed to take lunches to the academy due to some new rule the Hyuuga council made.

"Ah, forget it, here" Zeo muttered as he gave his food to Kenji.

"Why are you giving it to me? I fail either way, and you are risking your chance" Kenji said, confused.

"Eh, doesn't matter, just eat" Zeo said with a grin.

"I can't" Kenji said. "Oh come on, I don't care, just eat" Zeo said.

"No, I mean I can't, I'm tied to a pole" Kenji said, causing Zeo to sweat drop.

"Ah... right, well than, open your mouth, I'll have to put it in your mouth for you" Zeo said.

"No way" Kenji said.

"I'd rather starve than... uh" he muttered as his stomach growled badly.

"... fine" he said with a glare as Zeo began to feed him.

At that point, Kazu sensei reappeared, using a really strange genjutsu as a background effect. "You all..." he yelled as he appeared.

"Pass" he said with a grin as Taichi fell on his head.

"What the hell!?" he yelled.

"Simple, even with your chance to continue on the line, Zeo still tried to help Kenji, and even with his pride at stake, Kenji accepted the help, even if he only did it due to being hungry" Kazu sensei said as Zeo looked at him confused while Kenji glared and smirked at the same time, angry that he had been tricked, but glad he had passed.

"Alright, report here in two days for your first mission. And... try not to sleep in this time" Kazu sensei said with a smirk.

**Meanwhile, with Naruto**

At that time, Kakashi sensei had not yet even arrived with Naruto's group.

"Where is he!" Naruto yelled, annoyed.

He thought he would have been done by now, him and Zeo could have done a lot of training by now, but instead, he was standing there, fuming at the fact that a freaking jounin was late.

At that point, Kakashi appeared.

"Why are you all so early?" Kakashi asked calmly.

"EARLY! You said to be here at 8:00!" Naruto yelled in anger.

"Really? I meant to say Twelve" Kakashi said, most likely smirking under his... masks.

"Hn, let's just do it already" Sasuke said, annoyed as well, but not willing to agree with Naruto in any way.

"Fine, the test is simple." Kakashi said as he pulled out two bells.

"Whoever has a bell when the time runs out will pass, should you fail... two things will take place. For one, you will have your lunch eaten in front of you" Kakashi said, listening to the genin's stomach's growl before continuing.

"Two, you will be sent back to the academy" Kakashi said.

"But wait, there are only two bells!" Sakura pointed out.

"Correct, that means one of you fails no matter what happens" Kakashi said.

"Anyways... three... two... one... go" Kakashi said as Sasuke and Sakura jumped back to hide while Naruto went on the offensive.

"Hn, just like him" Sasuke thought, annoyed.

Due to Zeo's help, Naruto's taijutsu had increased to the third highest in the class.

Naruto's taijutsu level was just below Zeo's, and Zeo's was just below him.

Due to this, Sasuke had pushed harder than he would have usually, beginning the training of a style he would not have attempted for a long time.

But even with the extra training, it seemed Naruto had no real chance as he was easily knocked away, only to grab onto a branch with one hand and throw seven kunai at Kakashi, leaving him only one spot to jump, to the left.

Kakashi, underestimating Naruto's plan, did just that, and nearly ended up skewered by about 30 shadow shuriken.

At the last minute, he used a henge and escaped, only to fall into yet another trap, and another, and another.

"Something is off here. There's no way he could have set up all these traps so quickly." Kakashi thought before noticing something, no matter where he appeared, the area around was always the same.

"A genjutsu!" Kakashi thought as he quickly broke it, or tried to anyway.

"Damn" Kakashi thought before thinking quickly.

"It seems to stop my henge's, so what if I were to use something else?" Kakashi thought as he quickly did some hand seals and shot off a Grand Fireball jutsu, ending the genjutsu.

"Not bad, but... where is he? There's no way a genin could keep a genjutsu like this in place even after leaving" he thought before his eye's widened and he looked down to see if the bells were still there.

"Good" he thought. "Heh, how da ya like my Henge canceller?" Naruto said with a grin as he appeared, standing on one of the trees.

"Not bad, but why didn't you take the bells?" Kakashi asked.

"Simple, that's the flaw, when you do the henge, it absorbs the energy around and causes it to waste more energy, but if I were to enter the area, it would break the genjutsu and you would actually drain my chakra. That's it's major flaw right now" Naruto said with a grin as he ran forward again.

"He already broke my genjutsu, but he used a lot of henge's, either way, he has less energy then he usually would" Naruto thought as he continued to attack, using a weapon he had found before.

It was similar to Asuma sensei's weapon in the fact that it was a weapon placed on the knuckles.

But there was a difference, these covered the entire hand and were quite similar to claws.

Due to what was in Naruto, this fighting style suited him pretty well, though he didn't know that was the reason, he hadn't yet thought of the two as being connected.

Naruto continued his constant attack, every now and then throwing a kunai or kick to throw Kakashi sensei off.

Sasuke and Sakura just watched, dumbfounded.

"Damn it. Naruto's already got a weapon of choice, and he's effective with it. That means he has an advantage at close range after all!" Sasuke thought angrily.

"Since when can Naruto do all this?" Sakura thought, remembering the genjutsu Naruto had made.

"What technique was that anyway? I've never even heard of it" Sakura thought.

Kakashi was also amazed.

"I expected the entire team to be less than this with all their abilities added together, but instead, this one kid... he's not matching me, but he's fighting at a low chunnin level already" Kakashi thought.

"Well, I better end this though" Kakashi thought as he quickly did a few hand seals, one's that Naruto, Sasuke, and even Sakura recognized as a katon seal.

"He's going to annihilate him!" Sakura thought.

"Good, he'll be out of the way" Sasuke thought, but neither moved to help him, one through fear and confusion, the other because he was telling himself he didn't care.

"And now, for the most powerful taijutsu technique in Konoha" Kakashi said as he used a henge on Naruto's strike and appeared behind him.

"Thousand years of pain!" Kakashi said as he rammed his fingers up Naruto's ass, sending him flying towards a nearby lake.

But Kakashi didn't end there.

He quickly followed up by running after the flying Naruto and knocking him back towards the ground, where he had made a hole.

From there, he disappeared.

As Naruto landed, he was pulled underground, cutting off his ability to move as only his head was out.

"Damn it! That was a cheap shot!" Naruto complained as he struggled to get free.

A very difficult challenge when the only movable part of your body is your head.

"Well... that's one down" Kakashi thought as he jumped forward, dodging a spinning kick from behind.

He then spun around to see Sasuke in a stance he hadn't expected.

"You have got to be kidding me" Kakashi said with a sigh.

"Gai and Lee's stance? I expected better" Kakashi thought with a sigh.

At that point, Sasuke launched himself forward, at an impressive speed, considering he was only a genin.

Kakashi dodged the attacks with ease however, taking out his famous book and beginning to read it, only for it to suddenly catch flame.

"Alright... now you've got my attention" Kakashi said as he put the burning book down and attacked Sasuke, getting ready to use his thousand years of pain once again.

That was when he heard a yell from behind him.

"Kage bunshin no jutsu!" Naruto yelled as twenty clones were made and instantly attacked Kakashi, causing Kakashi to lose focus on Sasuke long enough for Sasuke to counter with a grand fireball jutsu, which actually managed to hit Kakashi and do a bit of damage before Kakashi got annoyed and disappeared before destroying all the clones.

Sasuke nodded to Naruto, thanking him, as well as giving a signal for him to distract Kakashi.

Naruto nodded back, understanding the plan.

A bit annoyed about it, but understanding nonetheless.

He also held his kunai up at an angle, letting the light flash where Sakura was, telling her to use a genjutsu as well, and with that, what would have happened, changed completely.

Naruto ran in for an attack, pushing Kakashi into range of Sakura's genjutsu, causing Kakashi, who was currently occupied and didn't notice the change, to lose track of his surroundings.

Sasuke used this chance to use his most powerful technique at a near point blank range.

At the last second, Kakashi saw the attack, but he couldn't use a henge, due to the fact that Naruto had used his genjutsu as well.

In less than a second, Kakashi turned, and blocked the jutsu, but he didn't notice Naruto switching the bells at the last second.

He than ran past Kakashi, throwing a kunai at him to try and distract him.

From there, he slipped a bell to Sasuke before running off at a sprint to Sakura.

He quickly slipped a bell into her pocket, without her noticing.

At that point in time, the bell rang.

"Time's up" Kakashi said, noticing his bells were gone.

"They did better than I thought they would. But I was holding back. I... really need to get used to fighting without my sharingan" Kakashi thought as everyone walked up.

"Alright then Sakura, seeing as you don't have a bell, it seems you fail" Kakashi said as Sakura sighed and nodded.

The only reason she had helped was because she wanted Sasuke to pass.

"Hey, what do you mean she doesn't have a bell? Check again!" Naruto complained, pointing at Sakura's pocket.

"Hm? Can you check your pocket Sakura?" Kakashi asked, confused.

"Uh, okay" Sakura said, confused also.

As she reached, she felt her hand bump into an object, she closed her hand around it and slowly pulled it out.

It was one of the bells.

"Then that means mine's a fake!" Sasuke said, glaring at Naruto.

"Nope, your's is real" Naruto said with a small grin.

"Then that means you don't have one?" Kakashi asked.

"He was the one who got the bells, yet, he gave both of them up. I guess this means I can skip the next step." Kakashi thought.

"Ya, I don't" Naruto muttered with a sigh.

"In that case" Kakashi said in a menacing voice, you all... pass" Kakashi said in a happy voice.

"Re-really?" Sakura asked, confused.

"Yep. The point of this was teamwork even though one of you would fail either way. And it looks like you all did just fine. At first, there were a few problems, mainly Sakura staying hidden until there was a chance to help Sasuke, and Sasuke staying hidden until Naruto was out of energy, but you all pulled through in the end. Anyways, report back here in two days at the same time, dismissed" Kakashi said as he teleported away to go buy another copy of his book.

**Later**

"So how'd ya do?" Zeo said with a grin as he saw Naruto walk up, grinning just as wide as him.

"Heh heh, I got both bells, and gave both away, because of that, I passed, and got a compliment" Naruto said.

If he could have, his grin would have increased, but that was impossible for a human body... but let's get off the topic of what a human can and can't do.

It doesn't belong in a world where people breath fire, use hair as a weapon or have super strength.

(Sorry, I'm tired and I'm too busy listening to music to notice I wouldn't usually do this) "Cool, I got one of the bells, and the sensei didn't even notice until I pulled it out and showed it to him at the end" Zeo said as both him and Naruto began to laugh.

"So... did you try the jutsu out?" Zeo said with a grin.

"Yep, Henge blocker worked like a charm" Naruto said with a laugh, beginning to have trouble breathing due to all the laughing.

"So how long did it take for him to figure it out?" Zeo said while lying on the floor laughing.

He'd already gotten over the original joke, now he was just laughing to laugh, and that's usually the hardest to stop.

After a few more seconds of laughing, the two had to stop however, mostly due to the lack of air.

"Well, when's your first mission?" Zeo said with a laugh.

"Two days" Naruto said, trying to stop himself from laughing, but failing in the end.

"Well... it probably won't be anything big but... once the real missions begin, we won't be in town very often... so we won't be able to see each other" Zeo said, looking down at the ground as that fact dawned on Naruto.

"That's not fair!" he yelled.

"I know, but it doesn't change a thing either way" Zeo said with a small shrug.

"Well than, that just means we have to train more" Naruto said with a grin as he thought of something.

"Huh?" Zeo said confused.

"If we make Chunnin, we get to choose our own teams! We won't have to work with our current team at all!" Naruto said with a grin.

"That's right!" Zeo said, grinning.

"But for now..." Zeo began.

"Let's go get" Naruto continued, smirking.

"RAMEN!" they both yelled as they raced towards the ramen shop, ignoring the yells, telling them to slow down.

Zeo reached the shop first, by only a second however.

"Hah, that means you pay this time!" Zeo said with a grin.

"Ah man" Naruto complained, but, even now, he was still grinning his head off.

It was great, just to hang out with his friend. And it made it so much better when he thought about how things had been before, he thought with a frown.

"Two bowls of ramen" Naruto said as he shook his head, breaking the line of thought and quickly ordered.

"Coming right up" Ichiraku said with a small smile as he handed them the ramen.

"Itadakimasu!" Naruto and Zeo said with a grin as they began to eat.

In seconds, the bowl was empty and they ordered seconds.

Then thirds, fourths, fifths, sixths... this continued until they had each had twelve bowls.

"That was good" Zeo said as he got up and waited for Naruto to pay.

After that was finished, Zeo turned to Naruto.

"Like you said, we need to train" Zeo said seriously as Naruto nodded and they headed for their secret training area.

"Kage Bunshin no jutsu!" Naruto and Zeo said.

Naruto was currently trying to teach Zeo more about the jutsu, since currently, Zeo could only manage one weak clone, a major difference between the power in his.

Zeo had so far managed to reach up to 4 clones, but he couldn't make more.

Not because of lack of energy, but merely because something in his body stopped him.

What exactly stopped him was unknown, and would likely stay that way for a while.

But Zeo had a feeling he knew what it was.

Way back when, when the nurse had attempted to kill him, he had felt something, he wasn't sure what, but it was powerful nonetheless.

After about 8 hours of training straight, they both decided it was time to turn in, mostly because the sun was now coming up and they wanted all the rest they could get in case their "first mission" was more challenging then they expected.

"Seeya" Zeo said with a yawn as he walked off.

"Ya" Naruto said, rubbing his eyes as he walked off to his house.

As he reached it, he entered and went directly to his bed, falling asleep almost instantly.

Zeo reached his house and went to sleep as well, despite the fact that the sun was in his eyes, glaring into his eyes through the broken window, which hadn't been there the day before, but he was so used to such happenings that he didn't even notice.

Or that might have just been tiredness, who cares anyways.

All he knew was that, not only had they both made genin, but they had proven themselves to two jounin.

If that didn't help lessen the pain, what would? It seemed things might just be turning up for them at last.

Eh, 26 pages, better than nothing though only 4400 words or so though. Hope whoever actually reads this enjoys it, seeya


	4. Rio, warrior from an unknown village

Naruto Chapter 4, also, my update time will decrease even more for a few months. I have some extra work in school, and I won't be home for a week or two with no access to computers due to skiing.(Not complaining there. A week off school to ski heh heh). Added on, when I return, it will be the end of the school year... meaning many tests. From there, it will be summer, meaning I won't be at my computer any. Well anyways, here's chapter four, won't come out for a while. And to show you how long the wait will be. Today is 2-27-07 where I am. I'll tell you the date of when I finish as well

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. I only own the characters that make up Zeo's team...**

_**The Second Kyuubi Vessel**_

The next day, or rather, later that day, as they hadn't fallen asleep until about 5 in the morning, the two were found training yet again.

They had made a deal and they planned to keep it, simply enough.

They needed to get stronger, that was a fact.

Currently, they were training with their weapons of choice.

Naruto was weilding his claw like weapon and Zeo was using a blade, very similar in appearance to the water blade which he had used in the battle against his jounin, Kazu sensei.

To be more precise, they were trying to do something even some jounins never learned.

How to transfer their chakra into their weapon and give it elemental abilities.

To anyone passing, it just looked like two genin standing there, tensed up and concentrating.

And it was to that site that Sasuke Uchiha walked up to.

"Hn, why am I even thinking of this?" he thought, tempted to just walk away before they noticed him.

You see, the day before, he had seen how effective Naruto had been with his weapon, and it had angered him.

He had followed Naruto to find out exactly how he had gotten so strong, but all he had seen for about three hours was Naruto and Zeo laughing and eating ramen.

He had been getting ready to leave when Naruto and Zeo got up from the ramen, with a serious look and they then ran off towards the forest.

Luckily, they didn't take off at full speed.

If they had, Sasuke might have lost them as he was a bit behind and they made a lot of turns on the way there.

While lost in thought and memory however, Sasuke lost his chance to leave as Zeo and Naruto saw him and stared.

"Hey Sasuke, what are you doing here?" Naruto asked with a grin as he held his hands behind his head.

"Uh... I... never mind" Sasuke said as he began to turn.

"You want to train, and you're wondering what me and Naruto do that gives us so much progress right?" Zeo asked seriously.

Sasuke just turned, not sure what to say.

Zeo understood perfectly, but there was no way he was letting this dobe be an equal to him.

So in response, he just "hn"ed and continued to watch.

Zeo sighed and nodded at that.

Sasuke was the type that would never admit anything.

His anger over the death of his clan had been dulled a bit too much, and he had fallen into the cool and collected image to the point where he couldn't break it.

His mistake after all, but either way, whether Naruto understood or not, Sasuke had agreed and chosen to learn.

"Well, why not. We've grown so used to each other's attacks that they really don't seem to be learning much anymore. A new person to train with will benefit all of us" Zeo said with a small smirk.

Sasuke just glared in response. If it turned out that he was helping them rather than the other way around, he would be leaving instantly, but for the time being, training with them would likely help him more than anything.

He would be able to learn their style and judge how close he was to their power if nothing else.

"Alright, I'm ready to fight" Sasuke said with a cold stare.

"No, you're ready to train" Naruto corrected from the sidelines.

"Whatever" Sasuke muttered as he got in a fighting stance.

Zeo just sighed at this.

"Naruto is right. We need to train you and test you before fighting us will be of any help at all" Zeo said.

"Tests? Like what?" Sasuke asked.

"For one, there's always finding your main and secondary element" Zeo said.

"Yep, let's start with that one!" Naruto said with a grin. "I already know what my main element is. It's fire" Sasuke said, smirking.

Zeo then pricked him on the arm with a needle.

"Hey! What was that for?" Sasuke yelled at Zeo.

"The fact that flame is your main element is nothing to be proud of" Zeo said.

"Especially with your second element being what it is" Zeo said calmly.

"What?" Sasuke asked, angry still, but genuinely confused.

"Your other element is shadow. A rare element, and often considered to not be a true element, but either way. This means only one thing. Flame represents anger in this case. Shadow is hatred. For those two to exist as a permanent element in coordination shows of a tragedy. The hatred level has dulled, but you're trying to hide it with anger. Due to this, your elements are in the wrong order, so you can't reach your full potential" Zeo said calmly.

"I hate him no less than I did that day! Never doubt that!" Sasuke growled out angrily.

"There is anger in your voice, not hatred. Due to the way you just spoke, you proved me right" Zeo said, dodging to the side as Sasuke attempted to punch him.

"Whatever. I'm out of here you dobe's" Sasuke said as he left.

Those two were pissing him off way too much and, training or not, he didn't want anyone to ever say that.

After Sasuke was out of sight, Zeo sighed.

"Looks like he wasn't ready for his training" Zeo said as he turned back to Naruto.

Naruto nodded to him and they returned to their training.

A few hours later, Sasuke could be found sitting in a tree, hidden from view.

He was currently huddled in a ball, trying to make sure he didn't cry.

As much as he hated it, Zeo and Naruto were right.

He didn't really hate his brother, he was merely angry... but only the very back of his mind would ever admit it.

"Wait a second... that idiot Naruto noticed it as well... was it the training they did that allowed it to be so obvious to them? If it was... NO! I won't ask for help from them! I can do this on my own!" he thought.

"First things first... I need to change this anger back into hatred... even if I don't like what Zeo said, his theory about my power was true" Sasuke thought to himself as he did a few handsigns, forcing his own mind to relive the events that had brought forth the hatred.

Unknowingly, the fact that he subjected himself to these memories would someday make Itachi's Tsukuyomi technique useless on him.

Sasuke was not seen for the rest of that day, nor was his chakra sensed, causing a few rumors to spread among those who could sense chakra.

Sasuke had a tendency to hold his energy out, trying to show off.

And yet, there was no chakra at all, quite a surprise to most.

The next day, the many teams that had passed gathered for their first D rank mission.

"Alright! My first mission!" Naruto exclaimed, cheering as he got to the training ground, only to find Kakashi wasn't there.

"Ah man... why's he have to be late anyways?" Naruto groaned, sitting down in the grass.

He could see Sakura sitting to the side, waiting as well.

She seemed to be just as annoyed as Naruto, though she was trying not to say anything.

Her body movements made it obvious nonetheless.

Sasuke was sitting in a tree nearby, as usual, silent, and yet, for once, Sasuke's aura was controlled.

"He actually listened to what me and Zeo said!?" Naruto thought, confused.

A few hours later, Kakashi sensei finally showed up.

"Sorry, I was almost here when I saw a cat stuck up a tree." Kakashi began.

"Can it, you've wasted enough time as it is" Sasuke said, jumping out of the tree.

"Um... right, well than, time for your first mission" Kakashi said.

"Alright! Finally!" Naruto said, grinning.

It was then that Kakashi announced the mission.

"We are to escort... a toddler to his daycare" Kakashi said, watching as Naruto, Sakura, and even Sasuke's jaws fell to the ground.

"WHAAAAAAAAAT!? That's not fair! We're ninjas!" Naruto said, glaring angrily.

"You're also genin... and as it is, you cannot start with any other missions unless it is during a time in which such missions are a waste" Kakashi said.

"Like when? When would that be? I want it to be that sort of time!" Naruto complained, getting a glare from Kakashi.

"Those times are time's of war" he said coldly, causing Naruto to gulp.

"Nevermind" he said with a small laugh.

And so, team 7 began on their first mission... Naruto, and Sasuke as well, hated every single second of it.

Sakura was just glad to be near Sasuke.

Meanwhile, Zeo and his team were having a similar discussion.

"Why the hell do I have to protect a god be damned... basket of cookies anyways!" Taichi complained.

"Like you could suffice to complete any other mission anyways" Kenji said coldly.

"Shut up, I wasn't the one tied to the post!" Taichi said, annoyed, causing Kenji to glare with a look of pure hatred.

"Sheesh, would you guys calm down?" Zeo asked with a sigh.

"The sooner we get enough of these missions, the sooner we det to go to higher ranked missions anyways" Zeo said with a small smile.

"... if that's true, this should be easy. I can locate the one we are delivering this too on my own." Kenji said.

"And I can go find sensei real quick..." Taichi said.

"While I go to the Hokage's to tell him we're done with our mission." Zeo said, figuring out what they were planning with relative ease.

About thirty seconds later, their mission was complete.

Seeing what they were doing, Kazu sensei sighed.

"They are working as a team... but they are divided... oh well, they seem to be working well enough together" he thought.

By the end of that day, Zeo's team had already completed a full 50 missions of the D rank status.

"I need them to do something else... I'm running out of missions to give" the Sandaime thought with a sigh.

The next day, Zeo's group entered, expecting another D rank mission... or rather fifty.

Instead however, they were assigned a C rank mission.

"Are you sure this is wise?" Kazu sensei asked the Hokage while the team were standing there, amazed they were actually getting something else beside's D rank's already.

"No, I'm not sure. But I can't refuse to give them a mission at all in their first week and if they keep this up, I won't have missions left to give" the Sandaime said with a sigh.

After a few minutes, the genin's returned their attention to the Hokage.

"Alright, you will be protecting a messenger that is leading to a hidden village of which I have no authority to mention to any below Jounin class. He is currently injured, yet he needs to deliver this message. Usually, a mission such as this would demand a team of our best Anbu. Due to the fact he is a ninja himself however, the rank of this mission is only C-rank, meaning the four of you should suffice" the Hokage said, looking at their faces with a small smile.

"Perfect, I can prove myself here and now" Kenji thought.

"Hell's yeah! I'm gonna kick ass!" Taichi said with a grin.

"Alright... a chance to get stronger... I wonder how Naruto's team is doing" Zeo thought with a mental sigh.

"You will be given one hour to pack supplies and then, you will meet in front of the gate" the Hokage said.

"... dismissed" he said as Kazu sensei disappeared and the rest of them walked off .

Naruto's team on the other hand weren't doing quite as well.

In the past two days, they had only completed 4 missions, leaving them nowhere near ready to move up to C rank

"Alright! Hell's yeah! Booyaa!" Taichi exclaimed as they took their first step out of the village.

"... what the hell is wrong with you?' Kenji asked calmly, even though he was a bit freaked out.

"This is the first time I've gotten to go outside the village!" Taichi said with a grin.

"Er... same for me... but I didn't have to do that" Zeo said with a sigh.

"Well, anyways, it's about time we found the one we're supposed to be guarding" Kazu sensei said, looking around.

"That would be me" someone said as they got up off the ground.

It was obvious he was injured due to, for one, the large amount of freshly made scars across his chest, and the fact that he was limping greatly.

He had a forehead protector one, but it seemed to be blank.

He had Black hair in a style similar to Sasuke's, surprisingly enough.

Beside's the hair style, there were no other similarities for him to Sasuke though.

He had an eyepatch over his left eye and his clothing was pitch black.

At his side was a Samurai sword, seeming out of place in ninja artillery.

"So... we ready or what?" the man asked with a cocky smirk on his face.

"... yes. May I ask your name?" Kazu sensei asked calmly.

"Name's Rio... I ain't gonna answer what clan I'm from though" Rio said with a smirk.

"Alright then, let's get started" Kazu sensei said.

"You'll have to lead the way however" Kazu sensei said, sweat dropping when he realized he had no idea how to get there.

"Duh" Rio said, still acting really cocky as he began to walk off. Kazu sensei turned to his team and told them what formation to get into and so, the journey to protect Rio began.

* * *

... short as hell, but it's been over a full five months, I need to update this thing some time... only about 1/3 if my usual 

... date is 7-27-07...


	5. War in the Shadows

Chapter 5 of a story I'm wondering if I'll ever finish. Granted, I haven't finished any stories besides my story of the true Zeo Takamaru. Well, the date is 7-27-07... let's see if I can get it out faster than five months

**Disclaimer: I like grapes ... ... ... and I don't own Naruto**

_**The Second Kyuubi Vessel**_

Naruto could only look down in confusion as he read the note Zeo had left at the training ground when he left.

"He... got to go... on a C rank mission... baka!" Naruto complained as he turned and began to train on his own.

Sasuke, who had once again followed, though not to ask for training, overheard this and glared down at the ground.

"He's that far ahead of me? Damn it!" Sasuke screamed in his head as he ran off to train on his own.

Sakura... was too busy staring at a picture of Sasuke to even think of trying to become stronger.

Meanwhile, with Zeo's group... not much was happening.

"Oh come on, we've been out here for almost an hour and no one's attacked at all!" Taichi complained, causing everyone else to sigh.

"He's literally asking for trouble" Zeo thought, shaking his head.

"Does he want to die?" Kazu sensei thought.

"What an idiot" Rio muttered under his breath as they continued to walk.

"Hey! I heard that ya know!" Taichi complained.

At that point, Rio made a turn off the road and into a forest.

Everyone else turned in unison and continued to follow.

That was when Taichi finally got what he had asked for.

4 ninja, who seemed to have no headbands, attacked at that point in time, one of them at Jounin class.

He instantly began to fight against Kazu sensei, who was slowly being pushed back as he hadn't had time to draw anymore than his kunai while his opponent was using a blade.

The remaining three attacked Taichi, who back flipped out of the way and attempted to counter with a shuriken.

The shuriken was easily deflected, but it was all as planned.

The second the shuriken was touched, it unleashed a smoke bomb.

Using the distraction, Kazamaru, Taichi's partner, attacked full force, followed closely by Taichi himself.

"One down" Rio thought, watching the situation.

He was injured after all, and he didn't think it best to enter the battle if he didn't need to.

With Kenji, his opponent had been unlucky enough to try a spin kick similar to Konoha Senpu... unluckily, when his back was turned, Neji struck him directly in the back of the neck using his Jyuuken style.

That battle was over quickly as well.

"Two" Rio thought with a smirk.

It was then he saw that Zeo had frozen in place when a ninja jumped at him.

Sighing, Rio pushed off to that area, grabbed the ninja who was attacking and threw him over his shoulder.

Now turned towards Zeo, he sighed.

"Pay more attention next time. If you can't think on your feet, you just ain't fit to be a ninja kid" Rio said to Zeo.

"Uh... ya" Zeo said, sighing. He was the only one that had frozen up.

"And also, don't forget, your supposed to be protecting me, not the other way around" Rio said with a small smile.

"Right!... sorry" Zeo said, looking down.

By that time, Kazu sensei had gotten a chance and ended the battle.

"Well... that was annoying" Kazu sensei said with a small grin.

"Yeah, come on, lets go" Rio said as he began to walk.

Everyone immediately got into formation again and followed.

It was only a few minutes before another group of ninjas attacked.

Once again, these ninja's seemed to have no headband.

Unluckily, this group was a bit larger.

There were four jounin, all of them attacking Kazu sensei at the same time, and, rather then facing genin like before, the three genin of team 1 were facing chunnin level ninjas... but it seemed that two of the chunnin weren't very powerful either way.

One of the unidentified Chunnin attacked Taichi, who once again tried the smoke bomb in a shuriken trick.

It didn't work out so well as the chunnin was able to grab it at just the right spot to make sure it didn't explode before sending it back towards Taichi, who was unable to dodge and was soon unable to see as well.

Kenji attempted to go on the offensive, not noticing the strange energy around the chunnin he was fighting.

His Jyuuken hits had no effect and soon, the chunnin caught a chance and kneed him in the stomach, sending him a few feet back.

Zeo was having similar luck.

The chunnin he was fighting had started the battle off with a genjutsu technique that tricked the mind into thinking the body was out of chakra, meaning it was only breakable through pain as the most common way was to push chakra through your body.

Unluckily, no one had ever told Zeo that using pain also worked.

"Now that you can't fight back" A voice said to his side.

In response, Zeo threw a kunai in that direction, only for it to immediately come back at him.

He quickly rolled out of the way of the strike.

"You are doomed" Zeo heard from behind him.

He quickly spun around and leapt towards that position.

However, there was no one there.

"You can't catch me here" the voice said from above him, causing Zeo to quickly look up and nearly miss the strike coming from below.

Luckily, he saw it an managed to turn, meaning the strike aimed for his heart instead stabbed into his ribs, ending the genjutsu to his surprise.

Seeing this, he quickly countered with his ice sword and knocked the ninja who had attacked him out before falling to the ground.

He was currently bleeding profusely and he could feel poison in his body.

Surprisingly enough, he felt his chakra flare up and the poison dissipate.

The blood seemed to dry quickly and the wound closed.

Zeo was surprised, but didn't stop to think on it, Kenji needed some help with his battle after all.

Seeing this out of the corner of his eye, Kazu nearly stopped before remembering he was fighting and quickly jumped back.

In the battle between Kenji and his opponent, Kenji had absolutely no chance... up until Zeo entered in, activating a jutsu that knocked the chunnin to the side, bringing down his aura for a split second, giving Kenji a chance to strike and end the battle.

"... thanks" Kenji muttered as he and Zeo headed towards where Taichi was.

Using a wind Jutsu, Zeo blew away the smoke, revealing Taichi, who had managed to hold his own, with the help of Kazamaru.

With the smoke cleared, the chunnin he had been fighting quickly jumped back, throwing a few exploding kunai towards the three genin.

"Heh, there's no way he can beat all three of us!" Taichi said with a grin as he did a few hand signs and activated his Gatsuuga.

The Chunnin saw the attack approach and deflected it with one hand.

During this time, Kenji had attempted to strike from the side, but was easily parried.

Unluckily, the chunnin had lost track of Zeo when a wind jutsu struck him from above.

It wasn't enough to do much damage, but it was a good enough distraction for Kenji to get back up and strike again.

The ninja jumped to the side, taking the hit to the leg rather than his arm or chest and quickly flashed through some hand seals, ending with a Katon seal and he quickly used Grand Fireball jutsu.

The three genin instantly jumped into the air, trying to avoid the technique.

Seeing the second, smaller fireball that the chunnin had sent at them, Zeo used his chakra to make a shield and deflected the technique.

"This guy's tough" Zeo said, panting a bit.

"Hn" Kenji muttered, agreeing.

"I'd say..." Taichi said, nodding.

As they once again landed on the ground.

"Hey... I have a plan" Zeo said with a smirk as he told them the plan.

The chunnin suddenly lost sight of them due to a low level genjutsu Zeo had performed before back flipping out of the way of two Gatsuuga's coming at him.

He jumped into range of another wind technique with devastating power.

Once again, he back flipped away.

From there, he saw Kenji coming down at him with a Jyuuken strike.

Once again trying to back flip away, he found he couldn't move his legs, looking down, he saw a pair of hands holding him in place.

The Jyuuken strike struck him in the chest while the two Gatsuuga attacks swerved towards him and crashed into him.

Right as the Gatsuuga made contact, Zeo let go, letting him fly into a nearby tree, now unconscious.

"That... was one hell of a fight" Taichi said with a small grin.

Zeo grinned as well while Kenji just smirked.

"He was only chunnin though... I guess even I'm not that powerful yet' Kenji thought with a sigh.

Around that time, Rio had entered the fray and was helping Kazu sensei.

With his help, they managed to beat the jounin.

"Alright... I guess we should continue" Kazu sensei said, looking towards Zeo.

There was no evidence of the injury from when the genjutsu specialist had struck him.

"Eh, I guess so" Rio said, once again beginning to move, though at a slower pace.

The three genin were grateful for the slower pace nonetheless as they were exhausted.

About three hours later, Rio stopped and turned.

"Alright, this is as far as you can go. I can't let you into the village after all" Rio said as the others nodded and turned to walk off.

Rio turned the other way and walked through a barrier, disappearing to all those who were watching.

He then immediately came back out.

"Hey, guys! I'm adding another part to this mission, assuming you accept... this part'll be S rank" Rio said seriously.

"...what's happened?" Kazu sensei asked.

"Someone found the village, we need help now and I can't do this on my own" Rio said as they entered through the barrier with him.

As they entered, they found a literal war zone ahead of them.

Many had died and the attackers seemed to be wearing the same clothing style as the one's they had fought.

"I see" Kazu sensei said, looking around.

"Follow me... we need to get to the village" Rio said as he turned and tapped on a tree trunk three times.

It then opened, to the surprise of the three genin.

"Rio... who are the others?" someone asked from inside the tree.

They couldn't see the person from their angle however.

"Reinforcements... they were my escorts from Konoha to get here and we need all the help we can get" Rio said.

"This is a war, there's no place for kids here!" the voice said, annoyed, seeming to see the three genin, even though they couldn't see him.

"Eh, deal with it" Rio said as he entered the tree, followed closely by team one.

A few minutes later and they came out inside of the village.

"So... what village is this anyways?" Kazu sensei asked.

He had never seen any village like it before.

"Village hidden in the Shadows" Rio said, looking around.

"One minute" Rio said as he disappeared.

"Hidden... in the ... shadows?" Kazu sensei muttered as he looked around.

"This place is supposed to be nothing more than a rumor" Kazu sensei thought.

Zeo looked around as well.

"This place looks like it's supposed to be peaceful... but this is a war, as that one person said" he thought with a sigh.

It was at that point in time that Rio returned.

"Alright, I've delivered my message... and got the healer to heal me" he said, the scar gone and the limp also removed.

The scar could not be removed however.

"Anyways. I know you guys are a team but..." Rio began.

"I understand. This is a war. We need to be spread out to where we are most helpful." Kazu sensei said while looking towards the three genin.

They nodded to him and the three of them disappeared from view.

Kazu sensei and Rio nodded to each other before also disappearing.

Zeo ran through the village at a fast pace, looking for someone who needed help.

Seeing a woman who was currently being held to the groung by three guys while a fourth seemed to be fumbling with his zipper, he easily figured out what was happening and jumped down, hitting the man who had been messing with his zipper, and was obviously the team leader, in the back of the head with a spinning kick, knocking him unconscious.

Seeing this, the other three, who seemed to be genin rank, leapt towards him with the intent to kill.

Their intent proved to be their downfall however as Zeo's chakra reacted and knocked the three out with ease when sensing the oncoming attack.

"... why the hell was this not working before?' he thought before turning towards the woman who was still on the ground.

"Are you okay?" he asked, helping her up.

"Ya... I-I'm fine" she said, shivering in fear at what had nearly happened to her.

A few minutes later and Rio had found a safe spot for her.

He left her there and went to find more people to help.

He soon found a large group of about fifty genin.

"Not sure if I can, but it's worth a shot, he thought as he jumped towards them, flashing through some hand seals.

A tornado was produced and tore through the unsuspecting genin, killing all of them.

"... this is a war I guess" Zeo thought, looking away from the bodies. He hadn't meant to put that much power into his attack.

All across the village, similar happenings were taking place.

Taichi and Kenji had cleared out nearly all the genin currently in the village while Rio and Kazu sensei were quickly decimating the chunnin ranks.

Soon, the 5 of them met back up where they had started.

"This sure was easy" Taichi said with a grin.

"True" Kenji muttered.

"Well, this is only one battle... they'll send more tomorrow" Rio said.

"Come on... we should rest up" Rio said as he lead them towards a small house.

The next day, things were pretty much exactly the same.

Rio had managed to persuade a few more ninjas to enter the battle while Kazu sensei and the rest of them helped to clear out the village of enemy ninjas.

During the process, they were able to save a few people, some of them, being ninja, chose to help in the battle.

As the days passed by, Zeo and the others found the battle to be a bit too easy.

By about noon, two months after entering the village, there were no more attackers.

"So... does this mean we won?" Taichi asked with a confident smirk.

"I doubt it" Kazu sensei said with a grimace.

"I have a feeling tomorrow won't be so easy" Rio said

"Eh, you're just over thinking it!" Taichi said with a grin.

"I sure hope so" Rio said, looking out of the window towards the stars above.

The next day, Rio's prediction proved to be right.

But, rather than genin and a few chunnin, there were nearly 300 chunnin and over 70 jounin.

"They're going all out. They don't want to risk us managing to win" Rio muttered with a sigh.

"As much as they are doing, this still isn't a war" Kazu sensei said with a sigh.

"What do you mean?" Taichi and Zeo asked in confusion.

"This is a battle. An invasion of sorts. Sorry to say it, but your village is overreacting." he said to Rio.

"Eh, true..." he said as he looked at the jounin approaching.

"Unluckily, these assholes declared war, meaning my village won't fight back" Rio said with a grimace.

"Hmm? What does declaring war have to do with this?" Kenji asked.

"Simple. My village was started with one rule. We would never fight in a war. The makers of this village lost too much when they made this village due to the first Great Ninja War. Whoever these guy's are, they found out, and are using it to their advantage" Rio said.

"We persuaded some of the ninja we saw to join when they realized it was nothing more than a battle, but that wasn't enough people to make that much of a difference" Rio said as an enemy jounin suddenly appeared in their group.

The five of them jumped back quickly as the jounin suddenly exploded, nearly catching them in the explosion.

"A bunshin" they all thought as they spun around, each blocking a punch from a Jounin's Kage Bunshin.

The five then back flipped to their original position as the bunshins once again exploded.

"It would take only one ninja of jounin rank to do that about fifty times at average... altogether, they can do this over 3500 times with jounin's alone... if you assume the chunnins can do this... that adds another 10,000 or so... shit" Kazu sensei said after calculating it all.

"You can't be serious!" Taichi thought, groaning a bit as the enemy ninjas split up, so they couldn't be grouped together for an attack.

"I'm not... here" Kazu sensei said, throwing a bag of ten soldier pills to each of them.

"What do we need these for anyways?" Kenji asked, annoyed, no Hyuuga had ever been forced to fall to using such an item.

"We'll have to keep up a strong pace for at least 15 hours. A single flaw will result in death. These will keep up your energy" Kazu sensei said.

"Now then, split up" Kazu sensei said as another Jounin bunshin appeared and exploded.

The five ninjas once again jumped away.

This time, they headed off on their own, doing a few amazing acrobatics in order to avoid the explosions.

"Even with these pills, this will be a real challenge" Zeo thought as he continued to try and dodge.

It was getting harder and harder as fatigue began to fall on him.

Taichi and Kenji were having the same problem.

Neither of them wanted to be the first to fall to the pills, but they all knew they had nowhere near enough stamina to keep this up for 15 hours straight.

It was, after all, their first real mission.

Regardless of how strong they were for genin, they hadn't fought enough battles for their stamina to reach that level.

Rio and Kazu sensei were faring a bit better, but even they were beginning to slow down from the constant movement.

Elsewhere, many other ninjas from the village were fighting to keep up as well.

While they were all strong, they were running out of energy quickly.

If they failed to keep up the pace, they were surely dead, but the pace was unreal and truly grueling.

To be able to keep up, they would have to be unrealistically powerful.

But they refused to quit nonetheless.

Though not Konoha Shinobis, the will of fire was something that still prospered inside of them.

For a full 15 hours, the ninja's in the Village hidden in the Shadows kept this up.

Many were lost in the battle, but soon, the jounins and chunnins had wasted the last of their chakra.

Seeing this, the remaining ninjas turned to them and counterattacked.

They were in worse shape, body wise, but, besides using chakra to keep up their stamina in small amounts, their chakra was at it's full still.

In about an hour of battle, this invasion was stilled.

Most of the enemy jounin had fallen in the battle.

That meant this war was likely nearing it's end.

It appeared the Shadow village was victorious.

That was when a message was received from a shadow ninja.

"Our leader has fallen! Our Leader has fallen!" he screamed, running towards them.

The shadow village occupants turned and stared.

"But... how?" Rio asked, confused.

The shadow leader had been like his father.

He had held power that had been nearly equal to the Yondaime himself.

For him to have died in battle, added on with the fact that he had been in his office, hidden in case of such an outcome... what had happened?

"This attack was nothing more than a distraction. A group of assassins located our leader and engaged him in combat. They won due to numbers alone. When I arrived to check on him, I found the other ninjas dead and his body gone. One of the guards recognized one of the assassins who seemed to be acting as the leader... It was the legendary sannin, Orochimaru" the messenger said.

"What? He still lives?" Kazu sensei said aloud, forgetting the situation.

A few turned to him, but he said no more.

"No, he doesn't. His body was found at the scene" the messenger said.

"The sannin is dead... I see" Zeo and Kenji thought.

Taichi... well, he had tried to cheat from Naruto's test all those years ago.

He still thought a sannin was a mushroom... enough said.

"Well? Now what do we do?" Asked a couple of the Shadow village nin.

"Our first state of business is to instate a new Kage" Rio said.

At that point all eye's turned to him.

"Who should that be?" Asked a single ninja in the crowd.

"That is the question" Rio muttered, looking around.

"As there were no plans for a succeeder, we will have to vote on it" Rio said, looking around.

"We've already voted" most of the ninjas said, surprising Rio.

"Who then?" Rio asked, oblivious of the situation.

"You" a ninja nearby said with a smirk.

"Eh? You serious?" Rio asked in confusion.

He was, by far, the strongest ninja in the village, but this village's Kage wasn't decided by power.

It was decided purely by will.

"Yes, we are Rio. If not for you, we would have merely sat in hiding. Your will was strong enough to not only keep up through the 15 hours, but to help us see our own mistakes." A ninja said, grimacing a bit.

If not for this war, he would have likely been chosen as leader, but he had messed up in the battle and had lost the full trust of the village by choosing to go into hiding with a few others in order to form a resistance.

"Besides, even though it's got nothing to do with the village's leader, you are the strongest here" the ninja said with a smirk.

"... thanks... Sho" Rio said, looking at the ninja who had always been his rival.

His rival had admitted him to be stronger, meaning his reason for the rivalry was gone, but his friendship still remained.

He then turned to Kazu sensei and his team.

"As it stands, I would like the four of you to watch the happenings of the ceremony. and afterwards, report to the Sandaime of the events here. You are still to tell no one of this place, understand?" Rio said with a bit of a command in his voice.

"But of course, oh great kage" Kazu sensei said sarcastically, causing Rio to crack a smile.

"Anyways, thanks for the help" Rio said with a smirk on his face.

With that, the five ninjas in the center of the crowd fell to the ground.

Their energy had finally reached it's end.

The other ninjas carried them to a nearby building and placed them each in a bed.

"Amazing... if not for a couple of genins, we could have died" one of the members of the village said.

"Even though the genins helped, it was still Rio and Kazu who did most of the work" another said with a small smile.

"Either way, it's about time our village stopped hiding ourselves so completely. We thought separating ourselves would help... but it didn't. With the help of Konoha, our village would prosper a lot more" Sho said, leaning against the wall.

"We'll bring it up with Rio and the others when they awake" Sho said with a yawn.

It was late into the night when they had all returned and everyone in the village was exhausted.

It was another three days before the five ninja, who's names had become legendary in the village already, awoke.

"Ugh... my head" Zeo muttered as he pulled himself out of bed.

"Glad to see your awake" Kazu sensei said with a small smile.

"How long have I been out?" Zeo asked.

"As long as the rest of us. Everyone else got up about thirty minutes ago" Kazu sensei said.

"And... how long was that?" Zeo asked.

" ... about three days" Kazu sensei said with a small smile as Zeo's eye's widened and his jaw dropped.

He always found the look on a genin's face hilarious when they found they had slept for longer than about 8 hours or so.

It wasn't too long, considering, but it was a lot longer than how long one would sleep from regular exhaustion alone.

"Well, anyways, we should probably help rebuild this village. This mission has been moved up to the highest rank possible as we have saved an entire village and found information regarding a missing ninja" Kazu sensei said.

"Alright" Zeo said, rubbing his head as he got up.

"We'll be leaving in about a week. We still have to stay for the ceremony" Kazu sensei said with a smile as he disappeared.

Walking through the town, Rio looked at the village he was now the leader of.

"It seems so strange" Rio said with a sigh.

"You'll get used to it" Sho said with a smirk, walking up to him.

"Maybe" Rio said with a smirk on his own face.

"And besides, if you can't cut it, I'll take over for you" Sho said with a grin on his face.

"Like it'll ever fall to that" Rio grinned back.

The two were no longer a team due to events that had transpired years before, but they were rivals nonetheless.

After their team leader had turned on them in the middle of a mission, killing their third member, Jade, they had both returned to the village depressed.

It had been almost two years before they could talk to each other again without an all out fight breaking out.

Now, after all these years, they were once again, the best of friends.

Elsewhere, Taichi looked around the village, searching for ramen.

He soon found Zeo doing the exact same.

"Alright, the sooner we find this place, the better" Zeo said after they had talked for a few minutes on the subject.

"Yep" Taichi said with a grin.

"Which is why we'll split up. We'll use these to stay in contact" Zeo said with a grin, pulling out two walkie talkies.

"Alright, let's get going!" Taichi said with a grin as they both disappeared.

For the next few hours, the two ran around the village at full speed, searching for something, getting a few ninjas on guard at the fact they seemed so intent on finding something at a time like this.

In the end, Zeo stumbled upon a restaurant that hadn't been too badly damaged.

They were serving ramen.

Using the walkie talkies, Zeo sent a message to Taichi, who responded and followed the sound of the static from the walkie talkies.

Soon, the two entered and ordered.

As the ramen arrived, two nodded to each other seriously as they both brought their arms up.

"Itadakimasu!" they both yelled as they dug in, getting a few strange looks from all the others in the restaurant.

Elsewhere, Kenji was also walking through the village.

He had noticed something about Rio while they had been in battle.

For a split second, his eye's had flashed red.

He wasn't sure, since he had only seen it about twice in his life, but it had looked like a sharingan to him.

"It was probably just a trick of the eye's" Kenji thought with a sigh as he continued to walk.

A few days more and the ceremony took place.

A few hours of congratulation and celebration, and it was time to leave.

"As I said before, thanks for your help" Rio said, shaking hands with Kazu sensei as they turned to leave.

"I would send an escort, but I think you know how to get out from here" he said, turning to Kenji, who looked like he was confused, but really knew what he was talking about.

He had used his byakugan to trace the path there.

Granted, he could only use it during times of battle without drawing suspicion, so there were a few holes on the map, but they were easy to make up for.

"Well, than, I suppose this is goodbye... as I'm the new leader, I'll pay you all extra... on top of the increased rank extra" Rio said with a small grin.

"Also, I need you to deliver this message to the Hokage" Rio said, giving a scroll to Kazu sensei, who nodded as he took it.

With that, the Konoha shinobi disappeared.

"Quite the mission" Kazu sensei said with a sigh as they sprinted towards Konoha.

"I'd say. Considering it's our first mission, I think we did really well" Kenji said with a cocky smirk.

Kazu sensei couldn't help but laugh at that.

"Too true Kenji, too true" Kazu sensei said, picking up the pace a bit. Zeo and Taichi were smiling as well as they thought of the events.

"Can't wait to tell Naruto I did a SA class mission on my first mission!" Zeo thought, grinning.

"Can't wait to tell dad about this!" Taichi thought, also grinning.

After about ten hours of running, they arrived at the gate of Konoha.

"State your name and business" a gate guard said with a sigh of relief.

He recognized them pretty easily and had been worried. They were, after all, about 2 months overdue.

"Team 1 of this years graduating team, returning from a mission I have no authority to discuss" Kazu sensei said as his team walked up.

The gate guard nodded as he opened the gate and allowed them in.

"Alright, I think it best we head directly to the Hokage's" Kazu sensei said.

The rest of his team nodded in response and followed.

They soon arrived at the hokage's office.

An Anbu entered the Hokage's office and informed him that they had arrived, causing his eye's to narrow a small bit.

He knew something must have happened to have changed the length of the mission so much.

As team 1 entered, the hokage cut directly to the main reason for their absence.

"What has happened in the village hidden in the shadows that caused a 2 month delay?" the hokage asked calmly.

"Assassination of the leader of the shadow village, a war between an unknown village and the death of the sannin Orochimaru, to put it simply" Kazu sensei said with a smirk.

The Hokage's eye's had widened quite a lot through the explanation of the events.

"Here is a message from Rio, the new kage of the village hidden in the shadows" Kazu sensei said, handing him the scroll.

The hokage stared at it blankly for a second before choosing to open it.

"_I am sure this has reached you, Sandaime, so I will not worry about cryptic messages here._" the first sentence in the scroll said.

"_Not even my own village has been informed of this, but I have a feeling Orochimaru has not been killed. Our former leader's body was not found, as I had expected. Years ago, Orochimaru mentioned a technique that allowed him to transfer his soul to other bodies. I believe he may have mastered this technique and used it on our leader. There is no proof of this as of yet, but it all adds up in my eyes. I thought it best to inform you of this._" The first half of the message read.

"Interesting indeed" the hokage thought, rereading it to make sure he had not read it wrong.

Rio was right, it did all add up.

"Er... Hokage, are we dismissed?" Kazu sensei asked.

"Yes, also, according to the mission level Rio has decided on, I will transfer your money to your accounts" Hokage said.

The four ninja nodded as they disappeared.

"Alright, the mission is complete... we will not take any more missions for another few weeks so... just keep up training for now... I have my own business to attend to, unfortunately enough, so I cannot train you myself during this time" Kazu sensei said.

The group nodded once more and went their separate ways.

Back at the Hokage's tower, the hokage had begun to read the second part of the message.

"_Our village has remained a secret to all but the Hokage of the leaf for years, however... I have seen that staying in hiding only caused the loss of many of our ninjas. I would like my village to become public and be supported by Konoha as well. We will do our best to support you in response. At our current time, we cannot send any messengers to make it official by usual standards. However, that shouldn't change anything. I have left a single unsigned part of this contract. If you sign this, I will know and the second piece of paper hidden inside the scroll, which is blank will be revealed_" the second half of the scroll read.

The hokage stared at it for a few seconds before signing.

At that point, a second piece of paper fell from the scroll.

Written on it were the instructions to reveal the village's existence to all of Konoha, and the rest of the world, at the next Chunnin exam, which, for the first time ever, would have three genin from the village hidden in the shadows participating.

"Quite a mission those four went on... quite a mission indeed" the hokage said with a small smile as he looked at the scroll and saw what Rio was paying the four ninja.

His eye's widened a bit at that.

"Half a million Ryou each!?" he said, confused.

It was a lot more than even he had expected.

Elsewhere, Zeo was looking through the village, trying to find Naruto.

He had already checked the Apartment and training grounds, as well as the secret training grounds, but to no avail.

He finally checked to see if Ichiraku had seen him... and to get some ramen of course.

"Hey, Ichiraku, have you seen Naruto?" Zeo asked as he walked up.

Ichiraku turned at the voice and smiled.

"Sorry, he just left yesterday for his first C rank mission. He was so excited about going that he told us he was going fifty times over." Ichiraku said with a smile.

"Oh... I see" Zeo said, looking down a bit.

"Hey, cheer up, the first two bowls of ramen are on me" Ichiraku said with a smile seeing Zeo's face light up in response.

"Thank you so much Ichiraku! You're the best!" Zeo exclaimed as he was given a bowl of ramen.

"Itadakimasu!" he yelled as he dug into his first bowl of Ichiraku ramen in over two months.

* * *

Well... that's a surprise, this chapter only took three days to finish.. Heh heh, the date is 7-30- 07 ... the time is 2:35 AM Well... about twice as much as the last chapter, and a full 30 pages, good enough for me 


	6. Get Back Already!

And now, after getting two chapters of my X-Men story out, I'm back to this one... I do realize I haven't updated my others but... eh, who cares.

Here's Chapter 6. Today's date is 9-22-07. That way you'll know how long it took me to get it out.

Disclaimer: I always thought I'd rather be considered lucky than good... sorry, that's part of a song. I don't own Naruto, and my imagination is for sale if anyone wants one (bored)

_**The Second Kyuubi Vessel**_

"Man, it's so boring now" Zeo muttered as he walked through the town.

His sensei had said no more missions, and he just couldn't train on his own.

Naruto had to be there too, otherwise he wasn't determined or enjoying it any.

That was when two ninja's ran by him... on their hands.

"Yosh! Gai sensei, this training is great! I will become stronger quickly if I can do this, and if I can't, I'll do 1000 push ups. And if I can't do that, I'll do10,000 punches while hanging upside down. And if I can't do that-" one of the two said towards the other, who was now labeled as Gai sensei.

"Lee! The power of youth is as strong as ever in you!" Gai said in tears.

"What the hell?" Zeo asked as he looked at the happenings with a look of complete confusion.

"Eh, looks like it could be fun, and listening to those two talk is funny. Guess I have something to do after all" he muttered with a grin as he tapped his legs and arms and activated the chakra controlled weights he had bought on his first day as a genin.

He'd also bought a pair for Naruto, but he had forgotten to give them to him.

After musing over how he had forgotten, he quickly ran to where the two people in the strange green outfits were.

"Hey, you two!" he yelled as he ran up.

"Yes?" Gai sensei asked, still running on his hands.

" what amount of weight do you have your weights set on?" he asked.

"300 pounds!" Lee said with a grin while Zeo sweatdropped.

"I've got mine at 75" he thought with a sigh.

"Well, anyways, can I join you two?" he asked with a grin.

"Yosh, of course you may! Your youthful choice says much about you! Who are you anyways?" Gai said as he attempted to give his usual pose while running upside down.

This caused him to trip and slam into the ground, rolling a few feet before finally stopping.

"Er... name's Zeo" Zeo said with another sweatdrop.

"I hope I don't regret this" he thought as Gai got back up and had a youthful talk with Lee before beginning to run again.

Zeo flipped onto his hands and ran after the two.

"What a bunch of freaks" he thought.

"So, how far are we running anyways?" Zeo asked the two as he caught up.

"200 laps around the village!" Lee said with a happy looking grin.

Zeo nearly lost his balance when he heard that.

"What? Sheesh, isn't it like... 5 miles around the village" he asked.

"Yes! We shall run it all, and on our hands at that. The power of youth will not falter!" Gai yelled out confidently.

"Er... ya..." Zeo muttered as he calculated how far they planned on running.

"1000 miles!" he thought as his eyes widened.

"Well, I guess I better give it my all! I ran 600 miles before, though not on my hands... and I kind of fell unconscious afterwards. " he thought.

"Then I ran about 4500 miles with the us of soldier pills once, and I was unconscious for three days. Eh, I guess it's possible." he thought.

"Alright, sounds like a challenge" Zeo said with a smirk.

"Yosh, the power of youth is strong in you indeed!" Gai exclaimed as the three ran.

"This is insane" Zeo thought as he continued.

About four hours later, the three finally stopped.

As they did, Zeo fell to the ground, unable to move his arms, and having large amounts of difficulty breathing.

"You people... are insane" he muttered.

"No! We are merely youthful" Lee said with a grin as he got up and sat there.

"Heh. Well, I'm surprised I managed to do that" Zeo said as he turned off his weights and moved his body a bit.

"Oooooohhhhhhhhhhhhh! You had weights as well?! What were they set to!?" Gai asked with his trademark smile.

"Er... only 75. I've only had them for about two and a half months. And that time was on a battle field so I didn't have time to train or increase the weight. For the most part, I had them off as I needed to be at my best there" Zeo said to them.

75 pounds was pretty large in the long run, but compared to them, he felt ashamed for having so low an amount of weight.

"I see! Well, now that we have finished this running warmup, let us train!" Gai said with his famous pose.

"Er... warmup" Zeo thought as he stood up and realized that he was already healed.

"The heck? This is like what happened that one time" he thought as he remembered some of the battles from before.

"Alright, so what's the training?" Zeo asked with a grin.

"We will train on martial arts! As you haven't even started, I'll stick with helping you for now!" Gai said with a grin.

"Lee! You shall train on what I taught you last week!" Gai said.

"Yes Gai sensei! I will!" Lee said with a nod as he ran a few yards away and began to train.

"Er... alright then, here goes" Zeo thought.

"I will teach you a martial art style that is most common for a ninja to learn!" Gai said as he began to talk to Zeo and show him certain moves, which Zeo picked up instantly.

"How is it that you pick up these moves so easily?" Gai asked after a few hours of training.

"Simple. They're pretty much the same as the moves from the style I learned. The one I know is a combination of about 40 different styles, including weapon usage as well" Zeo said with a grin.

"Oh! This is great! You are strong indeed!" Gai exclaimed.

"Er... ya" Zeo muttered. "Well than, let us have you spar against Lee! We shall see whose youth is stronger!" Gai yelled as he went into his pose.

"Ah! My eyes!" Zeo yelled, falling to the ground twitching at Gai's smile. After a few minutes, he stood back up.

"Alright then... a spar... just taijutsu then?" Zeo asked.

"Oh! Yes! I had nearly forgotten to say that! You are thanked!" Gai exclaimed again.

"Er... ya, let's just spar" Zeo said as he got into stance before glancing at the weights he had on.

"Keep the weights on?" Zeo asked.

"Yes! For if you were to remove them, this spar would not train you as much!" Gai said.

'Ya... shouldn't have asked" Zeo muttered as he waited for Lee, who had stopped training as he heard the key words spar as well as his name, to get into stance.

"Alright! Let's begin!" Gai exclaimed loudly.

At that second, Lee launched forward with a punch using the left hand.

Zeo moved to the right side and parried the strike before pulling Lee the rest of the way through.

Zeo then jumped back a few feet and waited for Lee's next strike.

"So easily he deflected my attack! He is a worthy rival indeed!" Lee yelled out, causing Zeo to sweatdrop.

"Concentrate on the match Lee!" Gai yelled to him.

"Oh! Yes Gai sensei!" Lee exclaimed as he charged forward with a Konoha Senpuu (leaf whirlwind).

Zeo smirked and dodged the first part of the kick, pushing Lee's leg in that direction.

When Lee attempted the second part of the kick, the extra spin had him out of control and he merely spun around before slamming into a nearby tree.

"Unreal! He's only seen the move once, and he figured out how to counter it" Gai and Lee thought.

"Lee! I do not want to see you lose. Take off your weights and let this battle continue!" Gai said.

Hearing this, Lee pulled his weights off, as did Zeo.

At that second, Lee disappeared from sight and slammed his fist into Zeo's face, sending Zeo flying.

He then launched himself forward and past Zeo before spinning around for an attack.

As Lee shot his leg forward for the attack, Zeo moved his body and turned himself to the side, avoiding the kick.

He then shot his fist out into Lee's side.

Due to the speed Lee had shot Zeo off at, Zeo was fast enough to land this hit, sending Lee back a few feet.

"I have better technique, but he outranks me in speed and power" Zeo thought as Lee shot back at him.

Zeo was barely able to block the punch, but did not manage to block the inverted punch, which sent him flying back.

"If I had more speed and power, this would be easy" he thought as Lee kicked him into the air.

Zeo could do nothing but continue to fly up into the air as Lee continued his kicks, knocking him further into the air.

"Damn it" Zeo thought before smirking as he caught sight of a flash off the trees.

"So that's how he's continuing up. He's kicking me up, then kicking himself off the trees. Well, at the last strike, I'll have my chance" he thought as he waited.

After a few seconds, Lee got to what was likely to be the final kick.

They were now about twenty feet above the trees, meaning that Lee seemed to be moving slower when he reached Zeo.

That was when Zeo countered.

He moved to the side of the final strike and elbowed Lee towards the ground.

He then continued, doing what Lee had done, except in reverse, this time shooting down, meaning the power was not lost during the strike.

Likewise, the speed was only increasing, meaning even Lee had no time to counter.

After a few seconds, they reached the ground and both ninja's jumped back, both beaten up to their limit.

"I won't lose to you" Zeo panted out.

"Nor will I to you!" Lee exclaimed tiredly.

At that, both shot forward with the last of their strength and threw a single punch.

Both fists collided and both fighters fell to the ground, out of energy.

"Are you still conscious?" Zeo asked Lee.

"Yes" Lee said tiredly.

"Damn" Zeo said with a laugh.

"Guess that means I didn't win."

"Nor did you lose though!" Lee pointed out.

"Yep" Zeo muttered as he continued to lay there.

After a few seconds, both finally fell unconscious.

It was around that time that Gai finally found where they had landed and sighed.

"These two have fought with the full power of youth. They have both been exhausted to the limits of their youth" Gai said as he picked the two up and left to take the two home, grabbing the weights as he went.

He dropped Lee off first as he knew where Lee's house was before looking around.

"Now where is Zeo's house?" He muttered.

"I'll take him" Kazu sensei said, appearing out of nowhere.

"Alright then. I thank you!" Gai exclaimed as he handed Zeo to Kazu.

"I take it he trained with you and Lee?" Kazu asked.

"Yes! He did! He then sparred against Lee and the battle ended in a tie!" Gai said as he began to go into detail about the fight.

Ignoring him, Kazu walked off with a sigh.

"Those guys are still freaks" he thought to himself as he walked off.

"But I suppose it would be a good thing if he was to train with them. I don't have time to help him right now as it is." Kazu thought as he carried Zeo to his house. "He better not begin acting like those two though" he thought with a sweatdrop as he pictured Zeo with his hair in a bowl cut and the famous green leotards that signified one of the two taijutsu users.

"... I better check on him and make sure he doesn't do something like that" Kazu thought as he opened the door to Zeo's house and dropped him off.

"Well, either way, my team improving even more than they are sounds fine with me... they're already so powerful in comparison to how the teams used to be... and I hear the other teams have shown large amounts of skill as well" he thought.

"Well, if anything, the chunnin exams will be really interesting when these guys enter" he thought as he left Zeo at his house, locking the door as he left.

For three weeks, Zeo continued his training, waiting for Naruto to return, but he still didn't.

Zeo was, at this point, becoming quite anxious.

"That bastard better not have died damn it!" Zeo complained.

"If I can't even help him, then what the use of it all!?" he yelled at the wall, no one actually there.

"Damn it to hell! If he's not there, then what's the point of it all" he muttered, sitting there crying.

"I don't know if he's alive or dead! I can't help him at all! How am I supposed to deal with this" he muttered, trying to stop his tears.

"I hate this! If I'm not there helping him, then what the hell was the point of training for all these years so I could help him achieve his dreams!" he yelled again.

"You sure do yell a lot" Kazu sensei's voice was heard from behind the door.

"Er... you weren't supposed to hear that" Zeo said awkwardly.

"I know. I mean, who wants anyone to hear that. You sounded like you were gay" Kazu said with a smirk.

"What!? That's not true. I'm just worried about my friend. If he dies then everything we've worked for is useless!" Zeo yelled at his sensei, annoyed by the remark.

"Ya ya, whatever. Anyways, I thought I'd tell you that Kakashi and his group were seen passing the border into our country last night. They should be here in a few hours" Kazu said.

"...oh... so Naruto's fine?" Zeo asked.

"Yep, anyways, I'm going back to what I was doing before, seeya" he muttered as he left.

"Alright! Naruto's alive! Ya!" Zeo said with a grin as he jumped out the door and rushed over to the gate's.

"I said a few hours" Kazu muttered as he saw that.

"He really seems to care about his friend a lot" Kazu muttered.

"But it may be too much. There are too many ways this could be used as a weakness" Kazu muttered as he left.

"Come on! Where is he! It's been like forever" Zeo complained, pacing back and forth near the entrance.

"... you've only been here five minutes" one of the gate watchmen muttered under his breath with a sweatdrop.

"How long do I have to wait? I know, I'll go to him!" Zeo thought as he ran out the gate.

"Wait! You're not allowed to leave the..." the gate watchman said before stopping as Zeo ran out of sight.

"Sheesh, the new genin are insane" one muttered while shaking his head.

"That's for sure" the other said as they went back to waiting.

After a few minutes of running, Zeo caught sight of them... he was then in front of them, to the surprise of Sasuke and Sakura.

Kakashi had caught the movement, but hadn't been able to concentrate on it.

However, as there had been no killer intent, he saw no reason to say anything.

"Hey!" Zeo said with a grin. "Zeo!" Naruto said, grinning back.

"... impossible! He moved faster than Haku did! That's not possible" Sasuke thought with a glare.

"How much stronger has he become? Why can I not keep up with either of them damn it!" Sasuke thought angrily, still glaring at Zeo.

"Hey, didn't I tell you to change the anger to hatred already?" Zeo asked, blinking as he looked towards Sasuke.

"Shut up!" he yelled as he threw a punch at Zeo.

Zeo merely moved to the side, grabbing Sasuke's arm and throwing him forward, using Sasuke's own force to throw him to the ground.

"... so who are you, and how did you get admission to meet us?" Kakashi asked, looking at the one in front of him, who had just easily thrown Sasuke aside.

"He's Zeo! He's my best friend!" Naruto said with a grin.

"Hey! Wanna race back to the village?" Zeo asked Naruto with a grin.

"Sure!" Naruto said, grinning back as they ran off, barely avoiding Sakura, who currently attempting to punch Zeo for throwing Sasuke.

"... but, we're still about 30 miles from the... never mind" Kakashi muttered as he watched the cloud of dust from the two running.

"There are two Naruto's? That'll be annoying" he thought as he saw Sasuke get up and run after them.

"Hey, wait for me Sasuke!" Sakura said as she tried to keep up with him.

"... I guess we'll be running" Kakashi muttered, shaking his head as he ran after his students.

"What a weird group" he thought, thinking back to the mission they had just finished.

"It's so similar to my group it hurts" he thought, looking towards the ground with a sad look.

"But that won't happen to my group... I swear it" he thought to himself as he ran past them.

After about thirty minutes, the group finally arrived at the gates, or at least, Zeo and Naruto did.

Kakashi only jogged it, and still got there after about 35 minutes.

Sasuke took 40 and Sakura took around an hour.

"Damn it! A full ten minutes!" Sasuke thought angrily.

Even if it was Hatred he needed, it was difficult to not be angry when he seemed so weak in comparison.

"I need to train harder!" he thought angrily before catching sight of something on Zeo's legs.

"Leg weights? That's what it is! Then I'll get weights too! I'll get stronger than him, or else!" he thought angrily, or at least, he thought he thought it.

In reality, he had said it out loud. "I thought your plan was to beat Itachi?" Zeo asked, partially confused.

"Shut up, idiot!" Sasuke yelled at him.

"Whatever" Zeo said with a grin.

"Let's go train!" Zeo said as he turned to Naruto.

"Yeah!" Naruto said, grinning still as the two ran off.

"I won't let them surpass me!" Sasuke said as he walked off to train as well.

"Sasuke, wait for me!" Sakura said as she ran after Sasuke.

"... I guess I'll turn in the papers for the mission then" Kakashi muttered with a sweatdrop as he headed for the hokage's office.

"So then, the mission was successful I take it?" the hokage asked as Kakashi walked in.

"Yes, also, a message from Tazuna... due to some of the circumstances of the mission, it increased to an A rank, so... ya" Kakashi muttered.

The hokage merely lifted his eyebrow at that.

"Both you and Kazu's group end up with a mission of high rank. On top of that, both took a lot longer than expected. A strange coincidence considering" the hokage muttered.

"... yes, it is, but I don't think it's possible to stage it either way" Kakashi muttered, wondering now who Kazu's team was.

"Anyways, your team is dismissed... even though it seems they dismissed themselves a while ago" the hokage muttered as he waved Kakashi off.

"Yes sir" Kakashi muttered as he left to find the file on Kazu's team.

As he did, he noticed one thing, the image of the boy Zeo that he had met earlier.

"It is a strange coincidence indeed... But it seems these teams should end up becoming very interesting indeed.

Well, either way, it's time to get back to my book" Kakashi muttered as he left for his house.

* * *

ya... sorry it took so long. I wrote a few chapters on my other story, then I tried writing the whole entire Zabuza saga here, but it didn't work, so I left it, hoping to get some inspiration for it. After a month of waiting, I just deleted that part and started from scratch. End date is 11-6-07. and Zeo and Naruto are not gay. 20 pages 


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